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by 

Solomon Woohuuorth 


. 

Telling of His Capture and 
larvelous Escape from Prison 
in the Civil War 




















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EXPERIENCES 
IN THE CIVIL WAR 


BY 

SOLOMON WOOLWORTH 




NEWARK, N. J. 
1903 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS. 

Twr Copies Receive* 

OCT 5 ’903 

A Copyright Entry 
^vt-tAC i <f - / r i 

CLASS ^ XXc. No 

(» L *L U M- 
COPY 3. 


Copyrighted , 1903, 
by Solomon Woolworth. 


«• <> 





v°> v 

t 







EXPERIENCES OF SOLOMON WOOL WORTH IN 
THE AVAR WITH THE SOUTH. 


AVhen the War broke out I was in business in State 
street, Chicago, as a grocer and butcher. 

We all thought the first six months would put an end to 
the A\ 7 ar; that the first quota of men, which was seventy- 
five thousand, would be a sufficient number, but we found 
we had miscalculated the strength of the South. 

Abraham Lincoln had to issue a proclamation for six 
hundred thousand. Then he issued another proclama¬ 
tion, that every slave that came within the reach of the 
army should be free. He gave the South three months to 
make up their minds. It was the opinion of most people 
they would come in as they were, and enjoy all the rights 
they ever had, but they saw all the Western States were 
being settled by the free North. Now they knew with no 
more territory than they had in the South, slavery would 
be no good to them, so they decided to fight it to the bitter 
end. Up to this time we had no success, but when the 
three months were ended and we had started again, we 
had success. We didn’t have to take the slave back to 
his master again as the Potomac Army had done, but we 
armed him and put him back in the ranks to fight his 
master as fast as the army approached the South. 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


The slaves had heard of Master Lincoln’s proclama¬ 
tion ; they had flocked to onr army. 

Now the South dare not trust the slaves with their 
arms; all they could use them for was building fortifica¬ 
tions. Lincoln called for three hundred thousand men. 
The Democrats were opposed to the War—they didn’t 
want to go; so he let them off at three hundred dollars 
each. 

At this juncture of the war I thought if I didn’t go out 
and fight for my country I would have no right to own 
property in the country. The price this country would 
cost would be blood. My ancestors were all fighting peo¬ 
ple. My two grandfathers fought in the Revolutionary 
War and three uncles fought in the war with Great Brit¬ 
ain in 1812. One of them was wounded and carried a bul¬ 
let in his shoulder and drew a pension until he died. 

I considered the matter over and thought it was my duty 
to enlist. We had thought, until this time, that young 
men could put down the rebellion and the old men wouldn’t 
have to go out, but we found it assumed larger propor¬ 
tions than we thought. So, when they called for the last 
quota of men, six hundred thousand, we found the old men 
must go as well as the young. 

I sold out my store and prepared to enlist. I enlisted 
the second day of August, 1862, in the 113th Regiment of 
Illinois Volunteers. There were three regiments gotten 
up by the Board of Trade of Chicago. I enlisted in the 
third one. We went into camp at Camp Hancock, on 
Lake Michigan’s shore, for three months. There I learned 
to handle the musket in every shape. We fought sham 
battles and went on dress parade every day. Every third 

4 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


day we had to go on two hours for fatigue duty, and once 
a week guard duty. Every day, at nine o ’clock, the bugle 
would sound for the sick to report themselves. The doc¬ 
tor would examine them, and, if necessary would send 
them to the hospital. At night a line would form around 
the encampment, of soldiers, about twenty-five feet 
apart. The duty of the soldiers was to march up to the 
post and to turn and march back again. When they 
were put on duty they were given the pass word. 

Every two hours they were relieved by the sergeant, 
who put another man in their place. When the sergeant 
would get within a certain distance he was halted, and 
would have to give the pass word. If, however, they fail 
to give the password, the soldiers would call the corporal; 
then he would go out and take him prisoner and march 
him up to the regiment headquarters. There they were 
jmt in the guard house and kept until nine o’clock the 
next day. Then they would be examined by the officers. 

There was a lady, who kept a lunch stand, in the regi¬ 
ment. After they would eat their rations at the camp, 
they would go to her, and spend twenty-five cents for pies, 
cakes or sweets. The next day they would be reported 
on the sick list and would have to go to the hospital for 
two or three days. In this way they spent considerable 
of their money, which did them no good. 

I hold that such things shouldn’t be allowed in an en¬ 
campment of soldiers, for I have seen the folly of such 
things. 

Shouldering arms and presenting arms was very nice 
for the first two or three weeks, and talking of war news. 
We had to sleep on the ground at night. The bugle 

5 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


sounded at sunrise, which was a signal to get up and pre¬ 
pare for company drill. Many of the boys got tired of 
soldiering; it wasn’t as it was at home, where they could 
lay abed as long as they liked. Some of them deserted. 
I was detailed to go with a party to hunt a deserter and 
bring him back to camp. We went down to the city of 
Chicago and surrounded his father’s residence. It looked 
pretty warlike when we surrounded the house with loaded 
rifles, ordered to halt any one that came out. This we 
did at midnight. 

We had a very pompous lieutenant. He went up to the 
front door like a commanding general; he demanded en¬ 
trance into the house by the authority of the United States. 
If they didn’t open it in five minutes he would break the 
doar down. The father came to the door and he was 
frightened out of his senses; but the boy was not there, 
so we had all that scout for nothing. 

The boys got tired of this kind of play and wished they 
had never enlisted. About this time the army was de¬ 
feated at Harper’s Ferry. They were paroled by Stone¬ 
wall Jackson. The boys thought they were going right 
home but the government thought otherwise and sent three 
regiments of them up to us to guard. The boys were so 
mad because they didn’t go home that they were determ¬ 
ined to desert and go home. This took a very vigorous 
guard to keep them in camp, and quite a number of them 
were shot trying to get out of the camp. This duty we 
had about six weeks. 

When we first went into camp there were about eight¬ 
een, and we hadn’t a man among us that knew enough to 
make out a requisition to get rations. For one day we 
couldn’t draw rations. 


6 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


A squad came in at night, among them was a Mr. Con¬ 
way. This Conway had been a drunkard and his wife 
supported him by doing washing. He was an Irishman 
and had learned how to draw rations; so, when they found 
out he could draw rations, they voted him in orderly ser¬ 
geant. To clothe an Irishman with power then he likes 
to show it. Once in a while we would be drawn up in 
line on dress parade and some stranger would review 
us, with the view of being colonel of the regiment. After 
three or four times there came one George B. Hogue. He 
looked so grand sitting up there so straight on that noble 
horse. He could give orders so distinct and clear that the 
boys thought they must have him. Now, according to 
military, we should have taken one of our own command 
and voted him in colonel, but, instead of that, we took the 
one that was sent to us. He could rectify more whiskey 
than any other man I ever knew and stand up on his legs. 
His mother was a poor widow in Missouri, and had 
managed to give him a little military education, but 
with the education he inbibed all the bad habits going. 
There was a Mr. Brown. Now he was pretty smart and 
the boys thought best to make him lieutenant. 

He was a street-car driver. Yes, and he owed me two 
or three dollars. He was corporal when we first went in, 
but the boys jumped him right up to second lieutenant. 

There came a day when the company presented him 
with a sword. His wife was Goddess of Liberty, she pre¬ 
sented him with the sword. 

We had a good many visitors that day. The lieuten¬ 
ant swung the sword and said it would never come back 
disgraced. There were a great many patriotic speeches 

7 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


made and a great many Bebels slain that day, before the 
regiment had gone down South at all. 

I got up and made a speech. I said the time for a re¬ 
ward was after the work was done, and now, if Mr. Brown 
had been down South, and had received a good deal of 
glory for his gallant actions, then it would have been time 
to present him with the sword for his bravery. It looked 
to me as if it was paying him before he had done his 
work. No farmer would think of paying a man until he 
had done his day’s work. 

Mr. Doe was first orderly sergeant and afterwards was 
advanced to major. In this capacity he stayed all the 
while we were in the North. He drilled the regiment 
many times. There came a day when we went on dress- 
parade with the whole command—three regiments and a 
battery. Here we had to march and counter march and 
perform the whole routine duty. We also had to form 
a hollow square, and had to prepare to receive a charge of 
cavalry. This means to kneel down on one knee and put 
the breach of the musket against the other foot, and hold it 
up at right angles, just high enough to hit a horse’s 
breast. The file behind you kneel the same way, only the 
muzzle of the gun goes right over your shoulders, and, 
when a command is in this attitude, they look very hand¬ 
some. The next we had to stand a dose of cannonading. 
They drew us up in line in front of the line of cannons. 
I saw the boys begin to look pale; they wished they were 
back to mother’s apron string again, but we got through 
with it without any of us being killed. The gunners fired 
just as fast as they could, as they were practicing to fire 
quick. 


8 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


John Doe, when he came to the regiment had some 
friends there. They thought he ought to be made orderly 
sergeant. So, after a while, they made him orderly. 
When the regiment was made complete, they had to have 
an adjutant. He had some pretty warm friends in the 
command and they thought he would be a suitable one 
for adjutant, consequently they made him adjutant. In 
this capacity he served until the regiment went South. 

Every morning we had roll call. There would gener • 
ally be some one that wouldn’t come back at the limit 
of the pass, but, if they came in two or three days, they 
would give them a slight punishment and put them in the 
guard house for a few hours, or, perhaps, extra police 
duty. Those that didn’t report at the limitation of the 
pass were marked as deserters. 

I noticed after a week or so they dropped his name, and 
didn’t call it. Then we began to inquire into it, and found 
out that both the lieutenant and sergeant got a hundred 
dollars a piece for letting him off. We made him fur¬ 
nish another man in his place. They had to pay him a 
hundred dollars, so they only made a hundred out of it. 

John Doe was a fast young man and had a good many 
lady acquaintances, so he took it into his head, one day, 
to march the regiment all over the city. Where he had 
any fancy we had to march on that street, so he could show 
himself commander of the regiment. We marched down 
State street, LaSalle street, Dearborne and Washington 
streets. He had a great many acquaintances in the last- 
mentioned street. We had to go through the manual of 
arms—shouldering arms and presenting arms. Face 
right and face left. Then we broke into columns and 

9 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


marched up the street. This was in November, and in a 
pelting snowstorm all day long. 

Our camp was two miles from the city, so you may know 
that, after we had marched four miles and then all over 
the city, an angrier lot of men I never saw. When they 
got into camp, tired nearly to death, and did it all to grat¬ 
ify that simpleton’s pride. We wouldn’t have done it if 
we had the other commanders. This is all the glory he 
ever gained. 

The officers issued orders for all to report at head¬ 
quarters to sign for their pay. In this way they got all 
the soldiers in. Then they gave orders that they couldn’t 
leave camp any more as no passes would be granted. 

The next day Adjutant Fuller appeared on the ground. 
Up until this time we had been in State service. Now we 
were mustered into United States service. We were 
drawn up in line and the adjutant rode along the line and 
read the military tactics. He read how the soldiers must 
implicitly obey. If there was any that didn’t like the tac¬ 
tics they are told to step out two paces in front, and I 
stepped out. He rode up to me and says: ‘ 1 What does 
this mean! Are you going to rebel before you go out!” 
I told him that I heard him read that the soldiers must 
obey the orders of the officers. If any of my officers 
should order me to surrender, I couldn’t obey it. He 
said: 4 ‘ Shoot him, and I ’ll bear you out in it. ’ ’ The boys 
had lots of fun over it, and said I was one of the highest 
officers. 

Now we had rations issued to Cairo. I shall never for¬ 
get the day we marched away from Chicago. It was 
snowing as hard as it could snow. It had been adver- 

10 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


tised in the city papers that we were to go a certain day. 
The women were bidding farewell to their loved ones— 
never expecting to see them again, and there was plenty 
of crying done, and wringing of hands. 

I was glad that I didn’t have any family to leave. I 
had a young lady whom I had done a great deal for. She 
was my fiance. There were many promises to write let¬ 
ters every week. The women stayed at camp until we 
were out of sight. They waved their handkerchiefs as 
long as we could see them. I bid Chicago good-by, for I 
never expected to see it again. 

We were crowded into the cars—about a third more than 
the capacity of the car could hold. This way we had 
about three hundred and fifteen miles to travel. We 
reached Cairo four o’clock in the morning. We disem¬ 
barked from the cars and they drew us up in line and we 
had to stand for two or three hours. 

Our officers hadn’t sense enough to draw rations for us. 
They got us aboard the boat, then took possession of the 
cabins and put a guard to each door. Now my readers 
must know we had no rations issued to us in Cairo to carry 
us to Memphis for two days and two nights. The offi¬ 
cers held high carnival all the way from Cairo to Mem¬ 
phis. They had plenty to eat on the boat and plenty to 
drink. We could hear them in their debauch. 

We arrived at Memphis and disembarked there, and an 
angrier lot of men you never saw. We went one mile back 
of Memphis city, and went to the camp. 

We never saw Mr. Brown or Mr. Doe after we all took 
the boat at Cairo, but we knew they were in the drunken 
debauch. The next we heard of them they had resigned 

11 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


and gone up North. Mr. Brown went driving on the 
street cars again and Mr. Doe went hack to his old trade, 
piano tuning, and this ended all their military glory. 
We stayed in camp here about one week. We had to 
stand picket every night, expecting to be shot by the 
Rebels. 

Colonel George B. Hogue filled himself with whiskey 
and all went outside the lines. He came slashing through 
the brush after dark and he happened to come up in 
hearing distance of my post. I ordered him to halt, but 
he paid no attention. He thought because he was colonel 
he had a right, but I ordered him twice more to halt, but 
he didn’t halt. I had previous orders that, after I had 
hollowed halt three times, I should shoot them, and I was 
sorry afterwards I didn’t do it. I knew it was the col¬ 
onel for I had a little inkling of the plan. I called for the 
corporal and took him prisoner. When he came up to me 
there was a great bustle in camp and they called for volun¬ 
teers to go out and make a raid on the rebels, but when we 
got out I found the raid on the rebels was a raid on an 
old cow. Whitcomb was the boss of the raid and he shot 
her. We took her hide otf and cut her up and took her 
into camp. We left the hide and horns outside, where we 
killed her. The next day the owner came to camp and 
showed the horns to the officers. He said if he could find 
anything that the horns belonged to, he would punish the 
men; but he could not find anything they belonged to. 

There was a great secret in camp as to where the boys 
were going. This time they were going to attack a Rebel 
Major, and I thought he had a squad of troops with him, 
so they got me to volunteer to go, but when they got there 

12 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


it was a poor widow, left alone. It frightened her nearly 
to death, but they went on and robbed the hen roost and 
all they could get their hands on, and we returned to 
camp with a cart load of poultry. Now we got orders to 
march out to Tallahassee, about forty-five miles distant, 
and there was a stream of fire the whole distance, Rebel 
houses burning and stables burning. It was a very dry 
time. Everything you touched a match to it burned. 
The air was so full of smoke it was fairly stifling to 
breathe. 

Before I left Memphis I sent all my clothing and knap¬ 
sack back to Chicago. The rest of them didn’t send theirs. 
It was a very hot day when we started out of Memphis. 
The mercury registered ninety. You could have picked 
up a load of overcoats they threw away, it was so warm. 
When we were all ready to march, with the knapsacks on, 
we had to stand still two hours and a half, for the colonel 
to get sober enough to lead us. 

We had a matron with us and she was detailed to stand 
and fan the colonel for two hours. He was lying on a 
sofa taken from a Rebel’s house in the woods. All the 
way trees were cut down and fell across the road, and they 
amused themselves by firing at us while we cleaned them 
out of the road. 

When we got to Tallahassee it was a dark night. We 
encamped in a cornfield. It rained like everything and I 
took my blanket and laid on a bunch of rails. All you 
could hear was just a little squeal of a pig. I was left 
in charge of a hundred men to guard a lot of stuff we 
couldn’t carry. We were there two days; then we went 
about five miles up the river. We had to build a new 

13 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


bridge with the Rebels firing at ns all the time. When 
we completed the bridge we crossed over and went np 
five or six miles to a Rebel camp. After days of fighting 
we routed the enemy. Then we got orders to march 
back to Memphis again. We stayed there for about a 
week. Then we had a battallion drill and all kinds of 
drills. 

We arrived at Milligan’s Bend in the forenoon. They 
had just got their Christmas dinner prepared, but when 
they saw our army coming they pulled up stakes and left 
in a hurry, leaving their dinner all ready prepared on 
the table. Our officers enjoyed the dinner very much. 

We commenced disembarking part of the troops on the 
levee. Our lieutenant-colonel rode up and down the 
levee, two men holding him on the horse, and he was 
swinging his sword, telling how he cut the Rebels. 

When we got ready to march he was on the boat again, 
too drunk to go with us. The other officers, colonel and 
major, were also too drunk to go, and stayed on the boat. 
All to lead us, then, was a captain of Company B. 

We marched on the levee and the Rebels went into a 
swamp and kept up a steady fire on us. We went off the 
levee and took a road that led back to the railroad about 
five miles. There we tore up the railroad and made a fire 
of the ties and heated the rails until we could bend them. 
This was the only railroad that Texas had to supply the 
wants of Vicksburg. We returned to the boats again un¬ 
der a strong Rebel fire. 

Then we received orders to come on to Vicksburg, which 
took about twenty-four hours. When we got there we had 
to fight an enemy strongly posted on Walnut Hill, just 

14 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


back of Vicksburg. The boys found it was no fun in 
fishing up torpedoes. We had two men stationed on each 
side of the boat, and, when the grapple caught on to a 
chain, they had to raise it up carefully and cut off the 
torpedo. It was dangerous business and a great many 
were killed in doing it. 

I saw the bow of the boat all blown off by the torpedoes 
while the other regiments went up to fight the enemy. We 
were left behind to guard the fleet, and our colonel had the 
command of the force that was left to take care of the 
fleet. 

One night we were all ordered out under arms, suppos¬ 
ing we had to meet the enemy, but it turned out that it was 
some mules that had gotten loose in the canebreak and the 
colonel thought it was the Rebel’s cavalry. We had to 
stand under arms all that night, and dare not light a 
match. That was New Year’s night and the ice froze 
hard enough to bear a person. The colonel was so drunk 
it took two of his servants to put him to bed and he didn’t 
know where the command was, or anything about it. We 
stood until daylight and then went into camp on our own 
accord. There were thirty men who went into the hos¬ 
pital and never did any more duty. Among them was a 
captain of Company H. 

He brought to us a company of all able-bodied men and 
they were dressed in a uniform of their own. This man 
was a well-to-do farmer and got up a company of his 
friends. I went to see his widow after the War, as he 
had requested me to do, and told her just how her husband 
died. 

The colonel got sober enough to ride his horse by nine 
15 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


o’clock. Then we were drawn up in line, and the colonel 
congratulated us, saying we stood all night long expecting 
to be fired on by the Rebels. 

Now I told our captain to tell the colonel that, if he 
wanted to test the bravery of his regiment to get on his 
horse and ride towards the enemy, and I told him there 
was not a man in his regiment but what would follow him. 
Then I said to him, “You need not test your regiment by 
making them stand in the mud all night long. ’’ More than 
thirty of them have gone into the hospital and may never 
come out. After four hours 9 fighting they gave us a ces¬ 
sation of fighting for two hours until we could bury our 
dead. 

We dug a long ditch the width of a man and put six hun¬ 
dred into it. They were brought in on a stretcher; then 
they were buried and covered up and a board put at each 
end of the grave with the number of men buried there, 
which was six hundred and fifteen. 

I was posted right in front of the enemy’s line. When 
they came to relieve us we found out that the army had all 
retreated. Now there was a race for life, and the mo¬ 
ment we were drawn off they knew the army had re¬ 
treated. 

They started with their cavalry in haste after us. I 
couldnt run as fast as the other boys did, so I got out of 
the road and went into the canebrake while the cavalry 
went by me; then I went into the road again and went on. 
The cavalry went as near the fleet as they dare and then 
they came back. So, when I heard them coming, I run 
for the canebrake again while they went past. When I 
got down to the fleet they were away out in the Azoo where 

16 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


I could just make them hear. Then they sent a boat to 
let me on, and when I got on they had a good deal of fun 
with me. They thought the Rebels had captured me; but 
I told them the Rebels weren’t smart enough to do that. 

The fleet went on to Milligan’s Bend. There I volun- 
tered to General Sherman to go inside the Rebel lines, 
but he told me if there was any need of anybody to go in¬ 
side the rebel lines, he would let me know. 

We stayed there about a week. We had some skir¬ 
mishes with the Rebels. We lost one of the government 
wagons. The boat tipped and the wagon ran off into the 
river. The water was about eighty feet deep but they 
never tried to raise it. 

Now we sailed again to Young’s Point. Here we dis¬ 
embarked and went into battle array, and from Milligan’s 
Bend we went up the liver. We went to the mouth of the 
White River; we were there two days. I stood picket out 
in the swamps after two days. We went up the river 
fifty miles to Arkansas Post. There we disembarked and 
the officers issued rations. We had them about half 
cooked; then we got orders to fall in and prepare for bat¬ 
tle and left our rations on the field. I had four or five 
hard-tacks in my haversack. They had to do me two 
days. 

When we marched we marched under the enemy’s fire. 
We were in the woods all the way. When grape and can¬ 
ister are shot through the woods they make a terrible 
noise cutting off limbs and trees. 

There was one lieutenant who was struck in the leg by 
the grape shot. He said, ‘ 4 There goes one leg all to the 
devil.” Then they put him on a stretcher. Every few 

17 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


minutes they would be going along with the stretcher with 
somebody on it. 

We had to stand all night under arms and dare not 
light a match, and they were shelling all night. Every- 
once in a while someone would get a clip with a fragment 
of a shell. 

There was a high spot of ground in front of us where we 
could see the rebel fort. A lot of us boys crawled up 
there, but the Rebels let us know they could see us as well 
as we could see them and tired a volley upon us, which 
wounded four. If they hadn’t fired it so high it would 
have killed everyone. There was no curiosity, after that, 
to see the rebel fort. We marched around behind the 
Rebel fort until about noon; then we received orders to 
charge the fort. 

The fort had two miles of intrenchment around it; this 
entrenchment was dug about half the length of a man. 
The logs were laid tight to one another until the last log 
was about two inches apart—so they could put their mus¬ 
ket through it. The upper log would protect their head 
so they couldn’t be seen. Now they had tree tops which 
they cut down and sharpened every iimb to a point. They 
put about two rods of this stuff in front of the entrench¬ 
ment. 

Now you can imagine it would be a lively job to charge 
that entrenchment. The enemy was protected, while we 
had to crawl through those tree tops as best we could, 
while they were keeping up a continual fire on us. 

We had to stand a little while after we were ordered 
to charge, and the boys that were Christians took out their 
testaments and read them. We had one boy among them 

18 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


that got weak in the legs when he got where the enemy 
was, and the captain gave charge to everyone to shoot 
him if he turned to go back. Now, after that he was the 
bravest boy we had in the company. The captain took 
all the cowardice out of him. I gave myself into the 
hands of God and then went into charge. 

When we had marched a little way towards them we got 
orders to fall down and protect ourselves the best we 
could. It had been in the woods, and they cut it off. 
Now, when we fell, we hid ourselves the best we could 
behind stumps, rocks and little knolls. One of our men 
hid myself just behind a knoll, and it was just high 
enough to cover his head. 

There was a bullet that went through the knoll and on 
through his hair and I supposed he was dead. That vol¬ 
ley killed five or six of our men. One Dutchman got shot 
in the ankle and he screamed loud enough to frighten one 
to death. We kept on crawling up and hiding ourselves 
behind anything we could find to protect us until we got 
within about ten rods of the enemy. 

There was a log pile where they had cut off the timber 
and piled it up in high piles. A great many of the boys 
were behind that, so I crept up behind it, but so many 
of them got there that the rebels were killing them at every 
volley. There was an oak tree about four rods in line 
with this pile of logs, and, if I could get there, I would be 
safe, so I asked God’s protection and went out. There 
was the full regiment of the enemy and I was a lone tar¬ 
get, but when I reached the tree then I was comparatively 
safe, though some of the boys had crawled up behind me, 
they loaded their own guns and would hand them up to 

19 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


me; in this way I kept up a steady fire for three hours. 
One of the captains said: ‘ 4 They are getting the battery 
out so as to get range of us.” The captain yelled out: 
“Go for the battery!” and in less than three minutes 
there wasn’t a man or a horse left alive. Then the enemy 
surrendered. 

I was the first to see the white flag. I yelled, 4 6 They are 
surrendering! ’’ hut the boys said give them more, so they 
fired two or three volleys after this. Then the officers got 
a hold of it, and yelled cease firing, and then three or four 
officers went down and arranged for their surrender. It 
was an unconditional surrender. That night our officers 
took fifteen hundred more that had come to help them. 
We opened the line and let them march right in and then 
informed them that they were all prisoners. 

The next morning I went out in the back end of the fort. 
There was a load of Rebel beef. The shells had killed the 
mules and the driver. I cut off some of the beef and ate it 
raw. I thought it was the sweetest thing I ever ate. 
This day we were kept busy tearing down the fortifica¬ 
tions and burying the dead and putting the prisoners 
aboard the boats. This was the 12th, 13th, and 14th of 
January, 1863. It was on Sunday we had buried the 
Rebel’s dead and our own dead. 

We found one man where a shell had struck him and 
cut off both feet and thrown him outside of the woods and 
twisted him about twice around. Our own dead were 
found all scattered around the entrenchment. Some 
places they laid very thick. We found one poor fellow 
that was shot through the head, and some of his comrades 
were there and knew him. They said he was married 

20 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


just before he came South. Where we found him there 
was a large pool of blood, showing that his agony must 
have been very great. I think we buried more than a 
thousand of our men—not so many of the Rebels, but we 
thought there were more killed and they buried them dur¬ 
ing the fight. 

The next was the skill of the gunners on our gunboats. 
The forts were built with eight inches of oak timbers and 
railroad iron, put one tier across and then put another 
tier turned over. The river turned around here and left 
them about the middle of the river, and the banks were 
about twenty feet high. That gave our gun boats a chance 
to throw their shells right through their entrenchments. 
We threw the steel-pointed bullets, that weighed about a 
hundred pounds, and so the fort, after the cannonading 
of it, was all shivered to pieces. 

Their sweepstakes was on top of the fort and it had the 
muzzle of it shot off—about one-third the length of the 
gun—and dismounted. Besides, the other three rifled 
guns were rendered good for nothing. There were port 
holes, where they ran the guns through to fire and then ran 
them back and shut the port hole. I learned from their 
men that they had to take sixteen of the men and put them 
in at the point of bayonet, and three times over they had 
to do this. I went back to the tree where I had kept up a 
continual fire for three hours. I found where thirty bul¬ 
lets had struck the tree within the space of ten feet up the 
tree. This was the result of their firing at me. They 
thought there was a squad of Yankees there, and this was 
the reason that they had kept up a steady fire on the tree. 
We traced our steps again from where we started. The 

21 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


officers all got aboard the fleet and went down on that. 

They were always neglectful in their duty. They 
should have issued rations to us that night, so we could 
have cooked them and got ready to go on the boat; but, in¬ 
stead of this, they had a jolly good time over their victory. 
They were so drunk that they didn’t know it snowed at 
all. Wee laid down, two of us together. We had an oil 
blanket and a wool one; we put the wool blanket next to us 
and the oil one on the outside. 

We camped in a field where there had been Southern 
corn raised and they had to hill it up quite high, so it was 
up to our sides. Just after we laid down it started to 
rain, and it rained as hard as it could until about four 
o ’clock in the morning. By this time the water was mid¬ 
side of us. Then it began to snow and snowed about four 
inches. By this time it was daylight. In the morning 
all that could be seen was a mass of snow and water. 

The boys had set a cotton gin afire, and as many as 
could get to it got warm, but all I could get a chance for 
was to get a little warmth on my hand. The officers didn’t 
get over their drunken row until about eleven o’clock; 
by this time they had a good breakfast and were ready to 
let us go on to the fleet. You know they have their cabins 
all guarded, and we were just as wet as a drowned rat. 

The rebels we put aboard were four thousand five hun¬ 
dred; about thirty of them died by exposure to the cold. 
We went fifty miles down to the Mississippi. Then we 
stormed Napoleon with their batches, and we disem¬ 
barked. Our captain was given quarters in an asylum. 
We stayed here until we got our clothes dried and got 
warm. We went out around the village and it was a very 
pretty place. 


22 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


One poor fellow had been outside and had captured four 
chickens. We were detailed to hold a provost marshal. 
The guard put outside captured this fellow and took the 
chickens away from him and divided them between the 
officers. When the fellow told me he had the summer 
complaint so long, I was moved with sympathy and re¬ 
leased him. I told him when he saw me marching with 
my back towards him he must take up two chickens and 
leave, so he did so. The captain wanted to know, the 
next morning, where the two chickens had gone. I told 
him I didn’t see them go. I supposed he had gone when 
I had my back towards him. That ended the chicken 
fuss. 

We embarked again, and went down the Mississippi 
until we came where the Mississippi made a bend. There 
we tied up and a lot of the boys jumped ashore before we 
could get the guard out. There was a Rebel plantation 
about a mile from where we landed and the Rebels had 
about a thousand chickens, and our officers heard of it 
and stopped our fleet there. As fast as the boys came, 
they would capture them and take the chickens from them. 
When Birch had the command of the brigade there was 
one fellow who filled up his bosom with birch; then the 
whole command shouted. Here we embarked again and 
sailed for Milligan’s Bend. There were a hundred and 
twenty vessels. They went out just as an army would 
march. They had thirty bands of music. They com¬ 
menced playing “Hail, Columbia!” and it was the sweet¬ 
est music I ever heard. This way we went until we got 
to Young’s Point. The Rebels contested the march every 
step of the way. We marched until we came to the canal 

23 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


that Butler had dug. This was done to turn the Miss¬ 
issippi across the point and leave Vicksburg out in the 
cold. If they had put the mouth of the canal where they 
should it would have accomplished their purpose, but, 
instead, they put the mouth of the canal where the water 
was running out. Now, if they had put it about ten rods 
up the river they would have put it where the water was 
rushing against the bank; it would then have accomplished 
what they designed it should do. We worked in the 
water up to our waists and amused ourselves nights seeing 
the Rebel’s shells bursting in the air, and, when we saw 
one coming, we would tell the boys to look out, for the 
Rebel’s shells were coming. 

The Queen of the West ran the batteries. We were 
three miles away from her when the firing took place and 
the whole earth shook like an earthquake. This was a 
very dark night and she stole along until we got by most 
of the batteries. We went down the next day to see the 
Queen of the West. She had her sides lashed with cotton 
bales which protected her. She received only one shot 
that did her any harm. There I saw her attack the War¬ 
rington batteries. She fired one or two shots until they 
returned the shots, so as to see where they were located. 
In ten shots she silenced the Rebel’s batteries. She went 
down the river and captured considerable. After a while 
the Rebels captured her. 

Now General Grant had come. He rode up and down 
the ditch and said it was a ditch and always would be. So 
he set about to find some other way. He finally found 
ten sawbioh. This was filled with logs and flood wood all 
the way—eighty miles. I volunteered to him to go inside 

24 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 

the Rebel lines. This was on the 13th day of February. 

His headquarters then was on the Magnolia boat. He 
gave me a pass to go through the lines either day or night, 
and all officers were obliged to pass me. I went outside 
of our lines, which were several miles, but I didn’t find any 
way to cross the river. 

I learned there were not as many troops in Vicksburg 
as they thought there were. When I came back to our 
lines two soldiers took me prisoner. I showed them Gen¬ 
eral Grant’s pass, but they would not believe that it was 
his pass, so they took me prisoner to General Steel’s head¬ 
quarters. This was in a Rebel’s house. He gave me a 
drink of whisky out of his bottle and told me to report to 
General Grant. I reported to him and he was glad to get 
the report. 

The next scouting I did was to go down to Mississippi 
opposite Vicksburg. I had a pair of field glasses that I 
borrowed from one of the captains of our command, for 
the purpose of seeing what I could see with them, and to 
see how their battery was located. I got along down op¬ 
posite Vicksburg and had been there two or three hours 
spying around, and all at once they hove in sight. I hap¬ 
pened to see them before they saw me. There was a big 
log right in front of me and I crawled in under it, and 
there I had to stay until pitch dark. They did not come 
any nearer to me than where I first saw them. 

After dark I got into my boat again, and I found it a 
different job going up stream than it was coming down. 
I ran against the snags and all the flood wood. It was 
pitch dark while I was on the river. 

I saw I couldn’t go to Young’s Point, so I went into a 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


bayou, and, when I got within about a quarter of a mile 
of the shore the boat hit a snag and upset and sank. All 
I had in my hand was a paddle. 

My readers may judge what a time I must have had to 
be spilled out into the Mississippi River in the night. 
You see I had to swim and paddle myself to the shore the 
best I could. I came where there was a lot of floodwood 
which had gone into an eddie. There I climbed out on 
the floodwood and went across the floodwood to what 
should be the shore, but it was the length of my paddle of 
water. 

Now I had to feel my way with the paddle. When I 
found the water deeper than the length of my paddle 
then I would go some other way. When I got to the 
levee where the guard should be posted they were not there 
and I didn’t see any guard until I got right into camp. 
Then I was taken prisoner by the pompous Lieutenant 
Conway and held until the next morning. Then I reported 
to General Grant and told him what I had seen and what 
I had heard. I heard the enemy’s army was in camp three 
miles back of Vicksburg, and all their batteries had just 
enough men to man them, and that was all. 

I proposed to him to take fifty men and fifty horses, 
W 7 e had captured Rebel uniforms enough to dress them in 
cavalry dress. W T e had a boat below the Queen of the 
West that we could go over with. 

I also proposed to have the men volunteer and they 
would have done it if they had been asked to do so, and I 
would have taken command of the squad. I would have 
crossed the river down below their cavalry, then come up 
along the river until I could have seen them. Then I 

26 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


would have told them that Yankees were crossing the 
river below and for them to go and notify their army as 
quick as possible. 

We would have gone on, fifty of us, with a number of 
seven-shooters, and, when we had captured all their bat¬ 
teries, then we would put up a signal and the fleet would 
come down in a hurry, which would take them about fifteen 
minutes. This was a feasible plan and could have been 
carried out. It would have saved forty millions of dol¬ 
lars to the Government and ten thousand lives. 

What was the reason that General Grant wouldn’t do 
this? I think it was selfishness. He would not hear of 
any other plan for capturing Vicksburg only the plan he 
laid himself. I proposed to General Grant to go up the 
river four hundred miles to Memphis and come down in 
the rear of Vicksburg, through by land. He said my life 
was my own, and he gave me a pass to do what I was a 
mind to with it. He said if I got back alive he would give 
me two thousand dollars the minute I got back. He gave 
me a pass and transportation up the river to Memphis. 

When I got to Memphis I reported to General Hulbert, 
and he gave me all the assistance I wanted. I stayed in 
Memphis about one week, enquiring all about the old 
settlers there. At the end of the week I had made up my 
mind just how I would go. 

I took the name of Robert White. I learned here that 
the planters had to take out allegiance to the United 
States before they could do any business. I represented 
myself to be a planter from Memphis, sent down by the 
planters of Memphis to see if the Rebellion was going to 
hold out or not. 


27 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


The next morning I took the cars and went thirty miles 
and, when I got through the lines into the Rebel country 
there was nothing, only myself and God. I had to be pro¬ 
tected every step of the way by the Lord. 

It happened that I came across a little boy about eight 
years old. Our army had been down there, and he fol¬ 
lowed them as cook for one of the officers. 

They had gone on and left him, and he was taken sick. 
I don’t think he would have ever reached his home if I 
hadn’t taken charge of him. I had to lead him all the way 
until we reached his uncle, who lived beside the railroad. 

We got there just at dark. I told him what capacity I 
was in, and I had run across the boy. I saw he was so 
weak that he would not be able to get home without as¬ 
sistance, so I took charge of him. His uncle placed full 
confidence in me. He treated me with the very best that 
was in the house. After supper he saddled three horses 
and gave me one to ride, and two of his sons took the other 
two horses and the little boy. 

We had about two miles to .go through the woods. 
When we arrived there his mother was so frightened it 
was a half hour before we could get her reconciled to 
know that it was her own people; but, when she realized 
that it was her own son, it took her a long time to thank 
me for his life. 

The next morning I went on my journey again. The 
lady gave me rations enough to last me three days and all 
the good wishes possible. 

This day I met six rebels. I told them what my busi¬ 
ness was and they let me go. I went along three or four 
days, until I came to Water Valley. Here was the first 

28 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


Rebel authority. I told them in what capacity I was in, 
and got a pass from him to go to Gernada, to General 
Tillman, and transportation. 

When I reported to General Tillman he was a brigadier- 
general. He gave me a pass to General Pillmanton. I 
had to travel about a hundred and fifty miles. Here I 
paid fifty cents for the hind legs of a squirrel. 

There was a Southern soldier who came in company 
with me for two or three days, and had kept me in rations. 
He had no pass, although he was going back to his com¬ 
mand. They took him prisoner and crowded him in a 
box car, while I rode in a coach. 

When we reached Jackson I reported to General Pell- 
manton, and got a pass to Vicksburg and transportation. 
When I arrived at Vicksburg I reported to the provost 
marshal. I showed him General Pellmanton’s pass and 
asked him for a provost marshal’s pass for four days. 
He took Pellmanton’s pass, and turned it over and over. 
He was a Northern man and he wondered how I came to 
have such a pass. I told him that I asked General Pell- 
manton for it and he gave it to me. He then began to 
question me, saying, I was an able-bodied man, and he 
wanted to know what part of the command I wanted to 
go into. I told him not any. 

He turned the pass over and I turned it back again, and 
asked him if that was General Pellmanton’s pass, and I 
says to him, if you don’t give me a pass to pass through 
Vicksburg and to last four days, I’ll go back to where 
I got the first one. You just ought to have seen how 
quick he wrote me out the pass. 

Now I went through Vicksburg four days, and paid 

29 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


ten dollars a day for board. The town laid on an incline 
plane. About half way down the town there was a line 
of entrenchments, and they set on an angle. There were 
about six entrenchments, this was made at the upper end 
of the town. The river turned nearly square around, so 
that they could fire right up the stream. From the bank 
there were about five batteries. There, of course, were 
lots of other batteries, but I’ll not take time to describe 
them. 

Vicksburg was the Gibralter of the South. There are 
three ridges in the rear of Vicksburg, about three miles 
from the front of the river. This was not fortified only 
a few forts where the road came in. They didn’t think 
we could attack them from that side. 

Now at this time I proposed to take Vicksburg. The 
army was in camp back here and only a few men left to 
guard the batteries, and no men in the rifle pits at all. 
Instead of having one hundred and twenty thousand, as 
we heard the report, they had just thirty thousand. 

Vicksburg is made up of chalk hills, and their inhabi¬ 
tants were busy cutting caves, which they would cut in 
about five feet. Then they would sheer off either right 
or left, so as the shells couldn’t kill everybody in the 
cave. 

I looked across the river and saw our army lying at 
\oung’s Point, and I would have given the world if I 
could have gone across. The two thousand dollars that 
General Grant promised me didn’t look larger than a 
scrap of paper.. I had got all the information I needed. 
The next question was to get to General Grant to tell 
him. The cars had broken down so I couldn’t get back. 

30 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


Then I had to foot it forty-five miles to get back to Jack- 
son. About midnight I came to Big Black River. This 
had two guards, one at each end and men marching back 
and forward in the middle. I showed them General Pell- 
manton’s pass and they passed me. I got to Jackson and 
asked General Pellmanton to pass me to Gernada and he 
granted it. 

Now the railroad was all torn up. There had been a 
freshet. While I was down there I got in company with 
a Missourian who had been to Jackson to visit his regi¬ 
ment and was returning back to run a grist mill. Some 
of the way we rode on an engine. It had one fellow to 
manage it, and his girl that he kept up a continual flirta¬ 
tion with. 

This Missourian hadn’t had any word from home in 
two years. He found that I was going to Memphis and 
he wanted me to take some letters for him. Now I be¬ 
lieve the Missourian went back on me. We both re¬ 
ported to General Tillman. He gave the Missourian a 
pass to pass to work, but to me he wouldn’t give any pass. 
I went down by the river and got across on a ferry boat. 

I commenced my fearful journey. And now I had no 
pass and I was liable to be taken by an TT man that would 
happen to see me. I asked God to protect me and went 
on. That night I stayed with an old farmer. The next 
morning I went on again. I thought I would take the 
railroad. 

I hadn’t gone very far before I saw two fellows pretend¬ 
ing to be hunting squirrels. When I got up to them I 
savs, “Good-morning.” I asked them if they had found 
any squirrels, and they said no. As we went along they 

31 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


got each side of me and pointed their rifles at me and said 
I could consider myself a prisoner. 

Now we weren’t very far from Water Valley, and I 
thought when I got there I could get my release. I 
thought these men had just arrested me on their own ac¬ 
count, but, when I got up to the station, I found they had 
received orders to arrest me from General Tillman. I 
stayed there that night and he went through the whole 
squad to find out who should guard me, and finally the 
sergeant had to do it himself. 

The next day they put me aboard the cars and I went 
to Gernada, and reported to General Tillman. He was 
dressed in a silk mantle, trimmed with gold lace from head 
to foot. I saw a picture of his headquarters before I 
went to war. There was a big, fat bull-dog with a big 
collar on his neck, and there were five or six lesser dogs, 
with small collars. Then there was a great lot of men 
that were just skeletons looking in, and the minute I 
saw his headquarters made me think of it. 

There was a chair up close by him, which I sat down in. 
He said, ‘ 4 Did I tell you to sit down in that chair. ’ 9 ‘ ‘ No, 

sir, ’’ said I, ‘ ‘ the chair was empty, and I thought I would 
sit down in it. I stayed there about two hours, and he was 
so busy he never looked at me. 

Then he told his guard to take me to prison again, and 
report again at eight o ’clock. 

Now, in this prison there were some of every kind. 
There was one very high-toned Southern fellow. He 
could use the bowie knife as handy as you could any 
knife. He determined that a little darkey should cook for 
him. The little fellow didn’t care to do it. Then he took 

32 





EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


his bowie knife and went at him. I interfered and told 
him all that were in that prison were all alike and he might 
as well cook for the little darkey as for the little fellow to 
cook for him. I said the day has gone by to use the bowie 
knife to make the darkey do as you want him to do. I 
say we are all alike in this prison. There hasn’t one of 
us got authority over the other. He concluded then to 
be pacified. 

The next morning they took me out of the prison and put 
me aboard the cars, and went about twenty miles, to Jack- 
son, and took me off the car I was on and put me on the 
other car. 

You may judge this ride was anything but pleasant. I 
thought General Tillman had received news that I was a 
Federal solider. If he had I knew I had just time to live 
until I got to Gernada. I thought I saw the crowd gath¬ 
ering on the hill to kill me. If General Tillman had got 
any information that I was a federal soldier I wouldn’t 
have had five minutes to live. 

They took me to his headquarters and I had to stay in 
there about two hours. Then he told them to take me to 
prison again, and report to him again the next morning 
at eight o’clock. The next day they put me aboard the 
cars again, and I went to Jackson. They took me and put 
me in prison. I was in this prison one month and all we 
had to eat was a pint of meal, ground up, cob and all, and 
about one-half pound of sugar. 

This prison was located in the middle of the town, it 
had been an old paper office. We were up in the second 
story. I think there were about two hundred prisoners. 
They were in the third story above us; that was filled full. 

33 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


We had an armed soldier at every door. There were 
camped about three thousand men around the city. Every 
man that lived there had to show a pass every time he 
went into the street. The streets were paroled both day 
and night. There were sixteen prisoners in the room that 
I was in. They were, half of them, Southern soldiers 
and the other half Yankees. Taking me to be a South¬ 
erner, the way I was dressed in Southern clothes. The 
room that we were in was about ten feet square. There 
was a door at the middle of the room which had a guard 
with a loaded rifle and a fixed bayonet. 

We had one Southerner who was an expert in breaking 
out of prison. He had a good many acquaintances; they 
smuggled in to him a small knife. 

One of our soldiers had a jack-knife he managed to save, 
although they searched him very close. They took the 
jacknife and opened it. They put the two edges together, 
and then, with the brick they pounded the jack-knife until 
they made the other knife rough like a saw. 

I should have been in that prison until doomsday before 
I would have thought of that. They sawed off the bar in 
a few days. The way we managed to saw it off in front 
of the guard and he not know anything about it was 
because some of us stood behind the one that was sawing 
and the rest stood in front of the guard, and the Rebels 
commenced singing 44 Bonny Blue Flag” just as hard as 
they could yell it, and the Federals sang the “Red, White 
and Blue.” This drowned the sound of the sawing, and 
it never attracted the guards. In this way we managed 
to saw off the bar, which took about seven or eight nights. 

We laid a block of wood about ten or twelve feet from 

34 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


the door, thinking the guard would sit down on it some 
night and fall asleep. Then we would close the door and 
make our escape; but this chance never came. 

We studied out many ingenious plans for an escape, 
but they all failed. The guard would search the windows 
thoroughly every morning. We made some putty out of 
ashes and puttied up the crack. Then we hung one of 
our coats over the bars. These were all preparations 
made for me. Once a week we had a chance to go to the 
Pearl River to take a bath. In going I laid out the road 
and thought, if I could ever get the chance to escape, I 
would go. The eaves of a livery stable came down even 
with the bottom of the windows of the prison. Then the 
next building was down about the length of a man, and so 
on, down one to another, until I reached the fence. Every 
street had a guard in it, and, when I got down to the last 
street, there was a ditch there as high as my head. At the 
end of the ditch there was a picket put there. These were 
all preparations made fom my escape, when I had a good 
chance. While in the prison they brought into us two fel¬ 
lows with their flesh torn off by the Southern hounds. 
They had forty-five hounds trained, with men to go with 
them, to hunt prisoners. I had seen a little example of 
what they could do which impressed me very unfavorable. 

There was a colored man that had a little pig which he 
sold for a hundred dollars. Every day or two they 
would take out a man and execute him. 

There was one man that had committed the unpardon¬ 
able sin. You couldn’t speak of anything in praise of the 
Lord which would make him mad. He had killed two or 
three people. He had once preached the gospel. Then 

35 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


he turned and said it was a lie. In this act he committed 
the unpardonable sin. 

He was taken out and executed while I was there. A 
squad of us was let out every day, and they would go to the 
two-acre lot for sugar and fill as many haversacks as they 
could carry. This helped out with our rations very 
much. 

One Saturday they came in to take out some men to exe¬ 
cute them, and the head man said if I had anything to say 
I must say it before Monday. For Monday, at ten 
o’clock, they would execute me. 

I told him I hadn’t had any trial yet. He said the like 
of me didn’t need any trial. He said that they had heard 
that I had been all over the country, and that I was a spy. 
I told them that they couldn’t execute a better man. 

I reviewed my experience in the South and I thought 
they were wrong. I went down with the determination of 
conquering them. I saw that I had gained the informa¬ 
tion I wanted for Grant, and had got within thirty miles 
of our lines. 

Now I couldn’t solve the case at all. I went, God being 
with me every step. He being all powerful should allow 
me to be arrested and taken to prison and shot as a spy. 
So I left it in this way. If they were right I was willing 
to be executed, but if they were wrong to furnish me with 
some way of escape that night, and I would know ever 
after, that I was fighting on the right side. 

We laid down, as usual, and about midnight I awoke. 
I slept next to the window. There was no glass or sash 
in the window. In case we wanted to get up we had to 
halloo to the guard first to tell him what he wanted. I 

36 





EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


spoke to him and he gave me no answer. Just then there 
came a flash of lightning and revealed to me the cir¬ 
cumstances. Two slept behind the door, so as to keep 
the door as near shut as they could. I saw that the guard 
had left his post, and probably he went into the hall where 
we had fixed a place for him. The preparations had been 
made for us all to escape, but I saw if we all tried to 
escape three or four of us would get shot and not one get 
away. But the question was to pull over the iron bar. 
It was a piece of round iron, three-quarters of an inch 
thick. I had a little more than a foot of purchase to work 
on. One thing notable was that they were all asleep. At 
this time which I never knew to have occurred before I 
considered this way of escape was for me, and no one 
else, so I went up, took hold of the iron, and, to my aston¬ 
ishment, it bent as easy as tarred rope. I could just 
squeeze through edgeways. The rain was falling in tor¬ 
rents and not another flash of lightning came until I was 
outside of the city. I climbed up the roof to the top, then 
down on the other side. Here I found another building 
that I could just reach down to, when I came to another 
one that I could just reach, and so on down to the fence. 
Then I easily reached the ground. 

I then crawled through several streets until I reached 
the outside of the city. Here I found one of those ditches, 
which was over my head. I went down until I came to 
the Pearl river. The guard that should have been at the 
foot of the ditch had left his post and gone up where they 
had a sibley tent. 

By this time I was out of immediate danger. The town 
clock had just struck one o’clock. Now it had begun to 

37 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


thunder and lightning, and continued for a half hour. 
All this time I had held a council of war with myself and 
had made up my mind what I should do. 

I first thought of hiding myself in the cypress swamp, 
but I thought of their dogs, so I gave that plan up. I 
took my fearless journey, and put myself in the hands of 
God to protect me. The first thing I came to now was a 
large creek. Where I stopped there was a tree which 
had fallen across it. There was about a foot of water 
running over the tree, so I had to feel my way as carefully 
as I could to get across it. 

I got one foot entangled in the limbs some way or an¬ 
other and I could not get it loose for some time. When I 
did it pulled off my shoe and stocking, and hurt my foot 
very badly. The other shoe and stocking I lost in my climb 
over the buildings. 

Now I circled around the town for I knew where the 
pickets were stationed. I got on the railroad track. The 
ties were a little more than three feet apart, so I jumped 
from one to the other as fast as I could, and, as the day be¬ 
gan to dawn, I got up on the rail fence, and along five or 
six rods and jumped just as far as I could into a swamp. 

I was then twenty-one miles from Jackson. I went a 
little way along and found a grape vine which had grown 
up over a pile of brush. I crawled in under the vine and 
wove in sticks until I made it so I couldn’t be seen. I was 
wet through and it turned off cold, which made me shiver 
all day long. About eight o’clock the dogs began to howl, 
and I supposed they were the dogs they had at Jackson, 
and I felt as though my heart was in my throat all day. 
It turned out to be just the neighbor’s dogs. 

38 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


These dogs will not hurt anybody unless they are set on 
your track. There were about thirty of them and they 
kept up a continual howl all day. I said to myself, I am 
enduring it all for my country. I stayed there until about 
ten o’clock at night and it had cleared off: and the moon 
shone brightly. I crept out of my cover and listened a 
few minutes to see if I could hear anybody. I then went 
to the road, and, just before I got there, I heard the rat¬ 
tling of sabres, so I quickly hid behind a tree. I saw they 
were not attracted by me. 

By their conversation I found out they were not on my 
track. It seems that they were two officers who had been 
sparking. After they had been talking a few minutes they 
separated and one went one way and one the other. 

I then went out to the railroad and stood to see if I 
could hear anything, but I could not, so then I went on. 
The roads in the South are not like they are in the North. 
They allow the brush to grow right by the edge of the 
track. Three or four times I had been fooled by these. 
Every time I had to put my ear on the rail to listen to see 
if there was any vibration, so as to tell if there was any¬ 
one coming. 

I came up again, and saw three more of these, and did 
as I had before, when, all at once, I heard a crowbar fall on 
the track, and there was no mistake this time for there was 
someone there. 

The thing for me to do was to hide away from them. 
This I did. I found a dry ditch which went on an angle 
off into the fields. It was over my head in depth. When 
I got a sufficient distance from the railroad to be out of 
all danger, I stood there and fell asleep. I don’t know 

39 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


how long I slept, but, when I awoke, there was a man 
about ten feet from me. He sank down so slow that you 
could scarcely see him go. I supposed he was another 
fellow that was trying to escape, and the quicksand was 
carrying him down. I got out of the ditch as soon as I 
could. When I went back to the railroad the men that 
were repairing the tracks had gone, and I went on with¬ 
out molestation until daylight. 

Then I found a thorn hedge which was so thick that, 
when you once got into it a little ways, you couldn’t be 
seen. There I laid all day long, and felt as though I was 
dying. My eyes were nearly closed from weakness. Ev¬ 
ery hair on my head felt as big as my finger, and my legs 
were drawing up, and I could not stretch them out. I 
knew if I didn’t get something to eat soon I would not 
live many hours. My readers may judge what a con¬ 
dition I was in. I had been without food for two days 
and two nights, and, having very poor and scanty food in 
the prison, left me in a poor state. I had been two days 
and nights without any sleep and with the terrible strain 
on my mind of escaping. 

There had been a colored man driving an ox team back 
and forth on the opposite side from me. I laid all day, 
dreading to put my life in the colored man’s hands to ask 
him for something to eat. By this time mv ankle was all 
swollen up, so I knew I must either put my life in his hands 
or die. I crept out from my hiding place and called to 
him. 

He told me that his old mistress would feed the soldiers, 
and showed me where they lived. I went there and, after 
being questioned as to who I was, where I came from and 

40 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


to where I was bound. Then, being satisfied, she called 
to the servant to cook all the food I wanted, but all she had 
to cook was to bake hoe cakes, which was done by scrap¬ 
ing the ashes from under the fire and putting the dough 
into patties. 

She would lay them on the hearth and then cover them 
over with hot coals until they were baked. I ate a num¬ 
ber of these with milk. She also fried some bacon, and I 
tell you it was good, what there was of it. The good 
woman cooked enough for me to take along to last me for 
three or four days. Then she gave me a pair of shoes, 
and they were appreciated as the reader will remember I 
had lost mine. 

My condition being so weak, after leaving the house and 
going out in the open air, I became violently sick, so my 
hearty meal didn’t do me much good. 

Now I went to a swamp and after traveling a little 
ways into the swamp I came to where two trees laid quite 
close together. I took some limbs and made a cover, and 
then I took leaves and stopped up the ends and put 
enough on top to make it perfectly safe, for, by this time, 
my ankle had swollen up three times its natural size and 
had turned black nearly up to my knee. So I had fixed 
this place to rest until my ankle had got better. I could 
hear a little creek running near by. My ankle pained me 
so I thought I would go down and put my foot in the 
water. I kept bathing my knee, and repeated this for a 
number of times that night, and by morning I noticed the 
swelling had greatly decreased. I kept repeating this 
bath for a few days. I sat on the bank half of the time 
and the other half of my time was in the little secluded 

41 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


inn which I had bnilt. By this time my leg had got bet¬ 
ter, the swelling had all gone down and the black all dis¬ 
appeared and my rations pretty well exhausted. 

The next night I took up my march again and now I 
dare not go on the railroad any longer. I had to keep 
within hearing of the whistle. 

The next morning I came to a plantation where there 
were about forty slaves working. Every time I would 
start to go to speak to them the spirit would seem to say to 
me, don’t go, and I didn’t go, for I don’t think they could 
have been trusted. About nine p. m. I started on my jour¬ 
ney, until I came to a big swamp, and, in the middle of it, 
there I saw two wild-cats fighting. I went within a few 
rods of them, but they were so busy with their fighting 
that they never heard or saw me. I tramped on until day¬ 
light. Then I came to a place where trees had been gir¬ 
dled. Some one had taken the limbs and made a fire 
with them. I laid down by the side of one of these heaps 
until daylight. Just at break of day I saw a colored man 
crouch around not very far from me. 

I got up and went to him. I saw he could be trusted, so 
I told him the capacity I was in, and a more pleased man 
you never saw. He jumped right up and down. He was 
an old slave and had been a great many years. From 
him I learned that the Southerners had lied to the negroes, 
telling them that in every battle they had killed every 
Northerner there was; but I told him it was to the con¬ 
trary. I told him he would soon see this country covered 
with Northern men. He says, “Laws me, when that hap¬ 
pens the good Lord may take me.” He was so pleased to 
have his children freed. He couldn’t stay any longer and 

42 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


talk with me for he must go with the mules to his mistress, 
so she could go to the mill. 

I waited for a while and I saw a little darkey peeping 
through the bushes to see if he could see me, and I halloed 
and told him that I was the man he was looking for. He 
brought me a great pail filled with Johnny cake and ba¬ 
con-enough to stand me four or five days. From here 
I started on again until I come to a thick swamp, so I 
thought this a good place for me to hide. 

The next night I started again and went on a piece. 
When I heard the cavalry men coming again I jumped 
out of the path I was in and him behind a log. 

After they had passed I jumped up and attracted the 
attention of some dogs that laid behind some other logs. 
They set up such a howl that it was nearly deafening, and 
pretty soon the dogs were answered by howls from a 
dozen other plantations, so I started and ran as fast as I 
could for a while, then I climbed up a tree and here I 
stayed for an hour or so, until the dogs all got quiet. 

Then down I climbed and went on my journey until day¬ 
light. Then I hid myself in a thicket near a plantation. 
Here I learned what slave labor was worth. They had 
about sixty slaves and a driver. They were in full opera¬ 
tion, just as they always had been. 

They were moving a rail fence across a ten-acre lot. 
Now if the rails was of any size it would take two strap- 
ing negroes to carry one rail. If the rail broke in two that 
would be all they would carry—the one little end. They 
would walk as slow as a man with the palsy. When the 
driver snapped his whip they would step a little faster for 
a few minutes. 


43 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


I could have moved more fence with ten good white men 
than they could with the sixty, and it would cost more to 
feed and clothe the sixty negroes than it would cost to pay 
the ten white men, so I said I couldn’t see what they were 
fighting for. 

I went on my travel and nothing occurred worth notice, 
but the next morning I turned up near another plantation. 
Here I lay and saw negroes work again. The first thing 
I came to was a small village. As I came in the village 
I asked a lady if there was any place where one could get 
something to eat, for I began to feel pretty hungry by this 
time. She pointed t j a house down the street. 

I went there, and to my astonishment, a Rebel lieuten¬ 
ant opened the door instead of a negro. His wife was the 
longest while cooking a meal of any one I ever saw. She 
had nothing to cook but some hoe cake and make a cup of 
coffee out of sassafras and fried a little bacon, as they 
thought bacon was something wonderful. 

I would have given the world if I had never gone in the 
place, for, as soon as I sat down, he began to question me, 
I told him I had been on duty in Jackson, and told him the 
name of my colonel and captain and that I had a leave of 
absence for ten days to get my family inside of the Rebel 
lines. Well, this seemed to satisfy him for the time being. 

Every once in a while he would look up at the rifle, which 
hung up on the wall, but, every time he looked at the rifle, 
I would look at him with such determination in my heart to 
get the rifle first that he concluded best not to touch me. 

Here he laid a plan to catch me. He said it was a 
good ways further to go through the woods than it was to 
go on the railroad track, so he said he would show me 

44 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


where it was. He pointed across to where there was a 
small patch of woods, so I started on, but felt suspicious 
of him all the way. 

As soon as I started he sneaked into the house and got 
the rifle. Then he went to the top of the hill where he 
could see down to the bush, but I dare not turn around, 
yet I knew he had the rifle. He watched me until I got 
out of sight into the bush. Now, in the woods there was 
a large creek running through, and there was a picket post 
stationed there, and he thought he had me sure for he 
didn’t suppose I knew where the picket was, but I did, for 
I had been through on that railroad twice before, and as 
soon as I got out of sight of him I then went a little ways 
further in the woods until I came to a good hiding place. 
I stayed there until night, and then took up my journey 
once more and traveled two days. Then I struck a planta¬ 
tion. Here I found two colored girls alone. They made 
me tell who I was. I told them what I wanted, and, when 
they got the meal half cooked one of them halloed out 
the old mistress is coming and there was a big heap of 
cotton in one corner of the room which they hurried me to 
and covered me up in it so I couldn’t be seen. 

The old mistress came in the house to see what they were 
up to, but they had hidden me. But they cooked my food 
all right and enough to last two or three days. The old 
mistress didn’t stay but two or three minutes. Then I 
crawled out, packed up my rations, which, of course, was 
hoe cake, and then hustled on until I found a good place to 
hide through the day. 

The next morning it was cold and I saw on one of the 
side hills a snake lying coiled up which I think must have 

45 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


been eighteen feet long. He had his head about three 
feet high and his forked tongue must have been six inches 
long. It was pretty cold and I think he must have felt 
lazy for he didn’t seem to have spunk enough to follow me, 
and I was very glad he didn’t. I went on further and 
found a good hiding place where I hid for the day. 

In this stay there were three deer came very near to me 
before they saw me. They looked at me for a second and 
then wheeled and did some of the keenest running I ever 
saw. The vultures and birds of prey had gathered from 
all parts of the earth to the South, because of so many 
dead bodies that were not buried, and they ate them up. 
There would be great flocks of them flying over me and 
looking down to see if I was dead or alive, and sometimes 
I would have to throw up my hands to keep them from 
lighting on me. In this way the day passed off. 

I could always tell whether there were many plantations 
around me or not, for, about sundown, the negroes would 
commence to call their pigs in for the night, and every 
negro would seem to have a different call and the hogs 
would seem to know it. The hogs were let out day times 
to dig roots to live on, and they would seem to get fat on 
them. After three days more I was hungry again and 
went, as usual, to another plantation. I called to the hut 
and found the negroes there. They said I must tell them 
who I was. I did, and then got them to cook something 
for me. They gave me enough to last a few days. 

The master was not up yet when I called there and the 
dogs were asleep, yet the negro showed me his master’s 
plantation. It was about a half mile from where we 
were. All the while they were getting me something to 

46 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


eat. They was singing hymns and grinding corn. You 
must remember their rations were issued to them but 
once a week and that pretty scanty too. Now what they 
gave away they would have to go short for themselves. 

When I got my rations and got to a safe place I stayed 
for the day. In the evening I had to take up my journey, 
as usual, and, after going three nights, I stopped and 
climbed up into a hay loft. 

I heard them get out the slaves to go on the plantation 
to work, and, after I thought they had gone out of hearing, 
I would crawl down and go on again, but just as I got 
ready to go I heard somebody climbing up the ladder, and 
it turned out to be a woman, and a more frightened woman 
there never was. It was a long time before I could pacify 
her to tell her who I was. When she came to her senses 
enough to know who I was, then I told her that I was a 
Confederate soldier going after my family to get them 
inside the Confederate lines. When she found out then 
she invited me to the house to have something to eat. 

It turned out that this lady was a Confederate lieuten¬ 
ant’s wife, and her husband was in the Virginia Army. 
It was about the time General Joe Hooker took command 
of the Potomac Army. She said “I hear they have a fight¬ 
ing general at the head of the Potomac Army, and I am 
very much afraid my husband will get shot.” 

After receiving something to eat, and some food to take 
along with me, I left, and on my way it came on a terrible 
rain, thunder and lightning storm. I climbed upon a 
cotton gin near a piece of woods. I never saw rain fall 
so heavily as it did. The lightning struck a tree and 
threw the splinters all over my cotton gin, and balls of 

47 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


electricity about the size of my fist came dancing on the 
cotton gin. 

There was a Rebel plantation in sight of me, but I did 
not dare to go near it. Then daylight came, and I went 
into the woods and stayed that day. The next night I 
marched all night on the road; and after daylight I came 
out by the Tallahassee River. Where I came to it there 
was a boat fastened by a chain and padlock. The river 
looked too formidable for me to swim. 

There were some little negro huts about a quarter of a 
mile off. I went up to one and knocked at the door. I 
found a colored woman, just as I had thought, but when 
I asked her if there was any man that could take me across 
the river she said old master can do it. He is somewhere 
around the farm. 

I would have rather been struck by lightning than to 
have heard it. To think I was such a fool to get so near 
our lines and then get captured. I told the old woman 
just as natural as I could, and that I would go and look 
for him; but I hadn’t got half way down to the river be¬ 
fore I saw him coming with his rifle. He marched up 
towards me until about five paces, and he ordered me to 
halt, and came up to me and put the muzzle of the rifle 
within about four inches of my heart. The rifle was 
already cocked, and he trembled like a popple leaf. Then 
he asked me who I was. I told him I was a Confederate 
soldier on leave of absence to get my family in the Con¬ 
federate lines. 

He says I have taken a vow to shoot every man I see 
straggling through these woods. I told him he hadn’t 
better keep the vow, for he might shoot a better man than 

48 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


himself. Well, what shall I do with you, then? he said. 
I said put me across the river, and let me go on my jour¬ 
ney. No, I won’t, he said. I’ll take you up to some Con¬ 
federate cavalry. You can, said I, but if there was any 
good praying ever done it was done by me. 

He got out his charger and mounted, and put the muzzle 
of his rifle at the back of my head. There, said he, you 
can forward march, stranger. When we got in sight of 
the cavalry he yelled, just as hard as he could, I have a 
prisoner for you, captain. When we got up there I saw 
the captain was an old man, and so was the rest of the 
command. When he came up he surrendered me to the 
captain in great agony. 

The captain questioned me as to who I was. I told 
him I was a Confederate soldier on leave of absence to 
get my family in the Confederate lines, and the fellow 
who took me up there spoke up and said, you didn’t tell 
me so. Now, says I, what did you want to tell that lie to 
get me into trouble for? You know I told you the very 
same words. 

Then the captain of the cavalry said, we don’t need you 
any longer. He said, well, then, I will leave the prisoner 
in your charge. I will assume all responsibility. I said 
to him before he went, if you had been down at Jackson, 
where I have been, you wouldn’t have had the chance to 
have taken a prisoner. 

The captain of the cavalry said, if you had gone across 
there you would have got into a nest of Yankees, for we 
saw a lot of them yesterday. Then he gave me a pass to 
his brother to put me across the river. I went up there 
and received the pass and went across. It would seem 

49 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


impossible almost, after being in sncli a peril, that I 
should be delivered so soon. About two hours was all the 
time I was held in jeopardy; but the Lord can do things 
quick for them that trust in Him fully. 

My next experience was with two dogs. They attacked 
at at Halley Springs, and Vandorren’s cavalry had burnt 
up the American stores for the capture of Vicksburg. 
Where they had burned up so many cars there was a 
piece of iron about three feet long. With this I managed 
to give one of them a welt which laid him out for all time. 
The other, seeing what had happened to his mate, took 
flight, yelling at every step. This aroused the neighbors, 
and all came running out with their lanterns to see what 
had happened, but I didn’t wait for a moment, but ran 
on as fast as my legs would carry me until daylight. Then 
I climbed a tree in woods, and stayed that day. 

The next night I reached our lines a little before day¬ 
break. The pass I had from Grant I found. So, as soon 
as daylight came, I went into camp, and there was about 
fifty who gathered around me with loaded rifles. I told 
them if there was a Rebel it was only one, and that they 
need not make such a fuss in taking one prisoner, and that 
I was as good a Union man as they were. Well, said the 
captain, you have no pass, and you have rebel clothes on, 
and I don’t feed no d-d rebel. 

I’ll detail a guard and put you aboard the cars ,and send 
you to Memphis as a prisoner. 

Now I had thirty miles to go on the cars. When I got 
there it was just sundown. They were going to put me 
in the Rebel prison, but I objected, and finally prevailed 
on them to take me to General Hulbert’s headquarters. 

50 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


When I got there he saw who it was, and discharged the 
guard very soon, and I never was so happy in all my life. 
I gave them the account of what I had seen at Vicksburg 
and round about it. He said it would be worth everything 
to Grant. 

The next day he gave me money to get me a new suit 
of clothes and transportation on down the river four hun¬ 
dred miles, and told me to report to General Grant as 
quick as possible. When I got down to Young’s Point 
I stayed there to visit my regiment for the night. 

Then I had eighty miles to go down to Tensawbio our 
army was scattered all through the full length of it, and I 
had to foot it eighty miles, and the largest part of the way 
was mud knee deep. I reached General Grant’s head¬ 
quarters. He was on a gunboat as lopographical engi- 
neeer. 

He took the lay of all the ports and trenches of Vicks¬ 
burg. 

When he got through General Grant gave me a hundred 
dollar bill, and he said he would give me the rest when he 
got more money sent to him. The gunboat that Grant was 
on was engaged in fighting the batteries off Fort Gibson. 
He said I hadn’t better go back to my regiment again; so 
he gave me a furlough for two months, and transportation 
to Chicago. 

Then I had to walk eighty miles before I could get a 
boat. I then took a boat and went up the river. When 
we had been on two or three days one morning we dis¬ 
covered a girl on the bank of the river, and some of the 
fellows called to her, and she turned around and made 
a very insulting salute. As we went on we had a salute 

51 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


in earnest with the enemy’s batteries. They threw a 
hundred pounds of shot through our smokestack, and car¬ 
rying a fellow’s boots with it. They fired five shots at 
us, but didn’t kill any of us. There was nothing of any 
interest happened until I got to Helena. There we stop¬ 
ped, and thought we would have to fight, but they finally 
drove the enemy off without having to fight. From here 
we went on to Cairo, Illinois. Here I took the cars to 
Chicago—three hundred miles. The first place we stop¬ 
ped after leaving Cairo was when they stopped for some¬ 
thing to eat. The water here was as clear as crystal. It 
was the first clear water I had seen since I left the North, 
and I never knew the value of good water before. Then 
we didn’t stop again until we reached Chicago. Then I 
went around to visit my friends for a few days, and all 
the time I lay in the woods after escaping from prison. 
The spirit said to me, tell how the boys are used in the 
army. They had a great many friends in Chicago. Two- 
thirds of the regiment was made up there. I hired Brian 
Hall and paid $30 for it. My advertisement cost $8. I 
advertised that a soldier had just returned from the war 
and would lecture there that night. I also paid $5 for 
music. You see, I meant to fill the hall, and I did to over¬ 
flowing. 

There were a good many tears shed when I told the 
story of how the boys were treated by their officers. After 
the lecture a great many came up to me, and wanted to 
know how their boys were getting : along. 

Although the lecture was free I received almost enough 
to clear my expenses. I knew well what I had done. I 
laid myself liable to be sent to one of the forts in Florida, 

52 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


where they would send anyone who would berate the offi¬ 
cers. But the spirit said for me to go ahead, which I did. 

The Chicago Tribune had a long editorial on the sol¬ 
dier’s speech. He said the private of Company G, of the 
113th Illinois Regiment, didn’t find feather beds down 
South to sleep on, so he was tired of soldiering. I wasn’t 
sick of soldiering at all, for I knew the fare I would get 
before I started. I was sick of being commanded by a 
whiskey bottle. They sent down the Chicago Tribune to 
all the regiments at Vicksburg. They had all the troops 
drawn in line, and read the papers to them. 

I gave five or six lectures on the war during my stay 
in Chicago. From there I went to Washington, D. C. 
Grant told me I could go and report to Abraham Lincoln 
of what I saw. 

After being there a few days I was able to see the Presi¬ 
dent. I waited my turn to go in and see him. When I 
got in there he welcomed me very warmly. 

I showed him my pass from General Grant. He had 
never seen Grant yet, and he wanted to know who wrote 
the pass. I told him General Grant’s adjutant. Well, 
said he, I would discharge him at once, and he reminds me 
of a man in Minnesota who went out after a snow storm, 
and his coat tail was so long that it wiped out all his 
tracks. I told him what I had seen, and he said he would 
have it attended to at once. He saw by my pass that I 
had been a scout for General Grant. So he inquired all 
about what I had seen. While we were talking there was 
a brigadier-general who came in bowing and scraping to 
the President. He said his command was very much de¬ 
moralized out on the front, Lincoln said, I presume they 

53 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


are very much demoralized, as all the Potomac Army is. 
Well, said the general, I think it would be a good idea to 
bring them back to the rear, and put them on guard duty. 
Said Abe, I used to be a half-way lawyer up in Illinois. 
We had a horse case, and the horse was so poor that they 
couldn’t decide what he was worth, so they put him out to 
pasture for a few days, until he got a little flesh on him, 
so they could see what he was worth, and then the horse 
up and died. So, general, I think you had better keep 
your command out on the front where they are, for I am 
afraid they would turn out as the horse did. So I think 
you had better keep them out on the front. 

Abe knew well enough what he wanted, for if he had his 
brigade in on guard duty he would spend his time in Wil¬ 
lard Hotel playing cards. If ever you seen a fellow sneak 
out of a place it was this officer. He went out like a spa¬ 
niel dog. 

The President saw by my papers that I had been out¬ 
side of our lines, and had seen a great deal of waste cot¬ 
ton. I proposed to him to gather it. He said I had bet¬ 
ter go to Secretary Chase and get a contract to gather it. 
He wrote me out one. I was to gather the cotton and take 
it on the banks of the Mississippi, where the boats could 
take it. He said he would give me half the money that 
the cotton brought when sold. The Government was to 
deliver it to Louisville, Kentucky. I was to have any boat 
that was in the Government’s employ to get it. 

I stayed around Washington a few days. I delivered 
a lecture in the meantime on the prospects of the war. 
When I got through my speech there was a lady who came 
up to me and said, you are needed in New York, for they 

54 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


were having such riots there. I told her I could not pos¬ 
sibly go, as I had other engagements. 

Now I started on my journey for Chicago. I stayed 
there one day and night. Then I took the cars for Cairo. 
From here I took the boat to Vicksburg. When I arrived 
there I stopped with my regiment that night, and this was 
the last I ever saw of my regiment. 

They told me not to show myself to any officer, for they 
had read in the papers the lecture I had given in Chicago 
berating the officers, and they were afraid I would be judg¬ 
ed in a hurry. But what suited me most was to hear that 
the officers had treated the hoys so well ever since they 
had read the account in the papers. I knew none of the 
letters the boys would send out, if they had anything in 
them about the way they were being treated, they would 
never go. But the officers found out I was one that dare 
go North and expose them. 

Then I went to General Grant, as my furlough had ex¬ 
pired. I showed him my contract from Washington which 
I had in regard to the cotton. He said he could not fur¬ 
nish soldiers to guard me, and I suppose he thought I 
couldn’t get any. He said all the cotton I could get to 
the river without a guard would be all right. 

I went out to Young’s Point. There we had a camp of 
refugee negroes, and when they came to our lines they 
would most always fetch a horse and cart. So I engaged 
about one hundred of them to go with me. At seven 
o ’clock they would he ready to start. 

The next morning when I went there were only three 
ready to go. We had to cross a long crossway that we had 
made when the water was high, and there was a big rattle- 

55 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


snake on nearly every log we came to, and the negroes 
would yell, “Massie, massie, here is a rnoga, ’ ’ for they 
were so afraid of the snake, and in this way I got in about 
two thousand dollars worth of cotton. 

I thought I would have it shipped up to Louisville, and 
would gather more. I had to show my contract to the 
master of transportation. He was a lieutenant, and said 
he couldn’t see how a soldier could get such a contract 
as that. He said he wanted to copy it, so if I would leave 
it with him a few hours he would have it copied. 

I called in a few hours later and it was not copied yet. 
Then he said to call next day. I did so. He said he had 
lost it. So there I was, helpless, without any money and 
contract gone, that was worth thousands of dollars to me, 
just by being foolish and letting an officer take my papers. 

General Grant issued an order that no boat should 
charge more than fifty cents to any soldier. We went 
along for a few days all right, but Juber couldn’t stand it. 
So he undertook to detail a guard. 

I saw what he was up to, and some of the rest of the 
soldiers saw it, too. A private when he is furloughed is 
the same as a citizen, except when an enemy should at¬ 
tack us. Then he would be obliged to obey orders. When 
Juber found out that the soldiers wouldn’t stand guard 
he threatened to put them in arms, and when he got them 
to Helena he would put them ashore and have them put 
in prison. 

I was dressed in citizen’s clothes, and he didn’t know 
that I was a soldier. I took a chair and got up by the side 
of him, and I said, I see by your straps that you are a 
colonel. Yes, said he, I am a colonel of the Eighteenth Ken- 

56 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


tucky Regiment. I said to him again, were you always 
a colonel? Ok, no, said he, I used to sell whiskey. My 
father was a hotel-keeper. 

I said, do any of the boys come in and drink with you? 
He said nearly all of them. I said, did you know any 
difference between them and yourself? He said he thought 
they were all alike. 

Now, said I, who made you colonel? Did the Govern¬ 
ment? No, he said, the boys voted me in. I says to him, 
do you suppose that when you got the straps on your 
shoulders that it would make any difference in your blood ? 

I said, there was a fellow that was always bragging 
about his blood. He belonged to a blooded family in Eng¬ 
land, and all he did in this country was to gamble. There 
was another fellow, a blacksmith, who didn’t claim any 
blood at all. They took a drop of blood from each other’s 
veins and analyzed it, and couldn’t find a particle of dif¬ 
ference in it. 

I said, if you take a drop of your blood or any of your 
men and analyze it you wouldn’t find any difference, 
either. This Juber and the rest of the officers went into the 
cook room, where all the negroes were cooking right in 
the month of July, when the sweat was running off their 
faces in a stream, and they paid a dollar for each meal 
all the way going up the river rather than to eat with the 
soldiers in the cabin and pay fifty cents a meal. How is 
that for high? 

Going up the river the next day the first we knew there 
came a volley from across the levee, and, strange to say, 
the boat was filled with soldiers to its utmost capacity, 
and fired two hundred shots on us and never wounded a 
man. 


57 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


If I hadn’t changed my position just as I did, they 
would have shot me through and through. I was sittting 
on the outside rail of the boat as a bullet struck the cabin, 
just in range of where I was. The enemy received a few 
hundred shots from our boat in double quick time. In the 
lieutenant’s room was about six demijohns of whiskey that 
a fellow had brought from Kentucky. He had just such 
a contract to gather cotton as I had, but I always thought 
those demijohns were the means of my contract being 
stolen. 

I went up to Cincinnati. After a few days I was hired 
by the Republican Club to go and lecture all over Ohio 
in company with another man. He would always lecture 
first, and then I would take the stand. He lectured on 
statistics and I on the war. When he got them all drowsy 
he would give the floor to me, and it would be about ten 
minutes before I would get them all awake and have them 
all clapping their hands and cheering as loud as they could 
yell it. 

I would tell them if they wanted the State of Ohio to 
look like Mississippi they should all vote for Van Lan- 
ingham, and you will see all of your beautiful little vil¬ 
lages look like nothing but smokestacks. Ohio is not able 
to buck against the United States. 

I said to them, now you think Van Laningham can call 
back all of the Ohio troops. I’ll disabuse you of that 
thought. WThen they are mustered in the United States 
service, and if they come back at all, they will come back 
to destroy your houses and everything you have. A sol¬ 
dier knows nothing but to obey. If he was told to burn his 
father’s house he would have to do it. 


58 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


I told them I hoped when I came to that village again 
IJiey would be just returning home from a funeral, and 
it would be the last secessionist there was. Then I said 
vote for Buff for Governor and you will soon see the war 
come to an end. 

I have been South and know how they feel over matters. 
If the North presents a unit against them they will soon 
give up. 

I had the last paper that was printed in Vicksburg, and 
sold it in Cincinnati for twenty-five cents a piece. It was 
printed on wall paper and only on one side. 

I went to work in a shop where they made bridles for 
the Government. There were about two hundred men 
working there, and about ten of them were Republicans. 
The next night I lectured down at the river. There were 
three or four hundred Irishmen there, with their wives, 
armed with sticks and stones and everything else. 

The man that was to lecture there dare not get up. He 
was afraid of the crowd. So they asked me if I would 
give them a speech, which I did. I asked them how they 
supposed Cincinnati was built. I says the rich wouldn’t 
carry the hod, and if there had been no laborers there 
the city wouldn’t have been built. You know the laborer 
has as much as he can do to look out for his back and 
belly. He never could have brought the bricks there and 
built the buildings and waited until they were rented be¬ 
fore he got his pay. So you see it is necessary for labor 
and capital to work together. 

Then, said I, if the South beats, as you all want it to, 
they will come from Kentucky over into Ohio, and their 
masters will hire them out for fifty cents per day, and then 

59 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


yon will have to take Biddy and all the young ones and 
go hack to Ireland. 

The Republicans came to me after the lecture and said 
they thought it wouldn’t be safe for me to go home alone 
without guards, for, they said, three or four roughs might 
follow you and waylay you. I told them they need not 
trouble themselves about a guard, and that I would look 
out for myself. 

As I went on my way I could hear them say the speaker 
spoke just right, for the negroes might come and take our 
work. One Saturday after the shop was cleaned up they 
all wanted me to give them a lecture, and every one had 
a smile on their face, thinking what fun they were going 
to have with me. 

The Republicans came to me and said I hadn’t better 
lecture, for it would be worth more than my life to lecture 
to them. I told them not to fear; I would take care of my¬ 
self, and I got up on the bench and went at it. I said all 
that was in favor of the lecture will keep order and all 
hands went up. 

Said I, you say that Jeff Davis is right, and that he is a 
smarter man than Abraham Lincoln. If the South has 
any friends at all now is the time it needs them. You pre¬ 
tend to be a friend to the South, and you are making 
bridles here every day to help conquer it with, as you know 
every bridle you make is doing so much towards counquer- 
ing in the South. 

If I felt as you do I wouldn’t be here twenty-four hours 
before I would be with them. I feel as though the South 
ought to be conquored, and I shall do everything I can to 
help conquor them. I said you hadn’t a drop of patriot- 

60 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


ism in your blood. You are a set of cowardly dogs. 

For the sake of money you will stay here and work, and 
let your friends die, and if I met one of you in the army 
I would shoot you quicker than I would a Rebel. If your 
were men you would go South and fight until you died in 
the last ditch. What opinion do you think your friends 
have of you in the South. You are making things to de¬ 
stroy them with, and telling them you are their friends. 

There were as many outside the building that heard me 
lecture as there were in, and the building was four stories 
high. Among the crowd outside were the bosses that we 
were working for. They said the lecture was worth fifty 
dollars to them. 

At the dinner table were two young fellows, who said the 
North could never whip the South, and that Old Virginia 
blood could never be conquered. Then I told them per¬ 
haps they would like to know what the blood of Virginia 
was. England first settled it, and her Queen was a vir¬ 
gin, and Virginia was named for her. 

All the fellows that didn't do crime enough to get a rope 
to hang them with were sent to Virginia. The ropes in 
those days were held at very high prices. 

When the colony got very large they wanted women for 
wives. They didn't all want to take squaws for wives; so 
they would gather up the bad women in London and send 
them over. A good looking one could be bought for a 
hundred pounds of tobacco, and the more inferior ones 
would fetch from thirty-five to forty pounds. The tobacco 
paid the captain for bringing them over, and I asked them 
if they thought they had anything to boast of for their Vir¬ 
ginia blood, and they both got up and shook their fists in 
my face and said it was a lie. 

61 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


There happened to he some old men at the table who 
had read the history of Virginia, and they said, boys, you 
can’t deny it,; this set the whole company in an uproar, 
and the two fellows were so very mad. 

I met an old man from Boston, and he had about $200. 
He wanted to go in business, so we hired a store on Sixth 
Street, Cincinnati, and started a trunk and carpet bag 
business. He was just running down with consumption. 
We slept in the store. This way we continued until 
spring. He would have me to get him a half-pint of whis¬ 
key every day, and that would cause him to lay in a stu¬ 
por most of the time. My friends advised me to take him 
to the hospital; so I took him to St. John’s Hospital. He 
had a gold watch in his pocket, and he said if he died I 
should send it to his daughter, who lived in Boston. 

He lived about two days after I took him to the hospital. 
He didn’t want to part with his watch until he died. The 
hospital was said to be free, and after he died I went there 
and the watch wasn’t on his person. I asked them where 
it was. They said he didn’t have any on his person when 
he came there, so they called one of the nurses that was 
with him when he died, and she said she didn’t see any¬ 
thing of a watch. 

I said, well, if you don’t find that watch in twenty-four 
iiours, I will have you arrested for stealing. So, before 
the twenty-four hours were up, the watch had been found. 
They told me at the hospital when I took the man there 
the cost would be $10, but before I got settled up with them 
it cost me $75. So much for a Catholic free hospital. I 
held the body for two or three days, and wrote to his 
daughters to come, but they never came. So he was 
buried in the potter’s field. 

62 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


Then I sent the watch to the daughters, as was his re¬ 
quest. About ten days after there was $200 came to him 
by express from his son, who was a lieutenant in the 
army. I took the package and expressed it back to where 
it came from. I wrote him a letter telling him of his 
father’s death and where he was buried, and then settled 
up the company concern. 

When I got settled up with the business then I went to 
Cleveland, Ohio. I got a job of being foreman in a lum¬ 
ber yard among a very lazy lot of men. I hurried them 
along as fast as I could without their getting mad, and 
one night, when I was walking on the street, the first thing 
I knew there was some one who came along with a stone 
in his hand and gave me a knock with it right in my mouth 
and said, take that for hurrying us men along in the lum¬ 
ber yard. It knocked out two of my teeth, and it was a 
long time before I was able to eat a square meal, so I gave 
up the lumber business. 

I stopped at a hotel, and went to bed, but the bed bugs 
soon took possession of the bed, so I took a quilt and 
thought I would try the floor, but they found me there, so 
I left and went to a nearby lumber yard, and got on top 
of a pile of boards, and there I made out to sleep the rest 
of the night. 

Then I went to work for a harness maker stitching on 
artillery traces. I stayed here with this man nearly a 
month.* Then I went to Ohio Heights, and went to work 
there for a harness maker, and worked for him three or 
four weeks. From here I went back into the middle of the 
State. I got a job there, and worked for a short time. 

I was out on a furlough during all this time, and was 

63 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


trying to earn a little spending money. I have just re¬ 
ceived orders to go back to the army, and now we start 
for Cleveland. Here we stayed for a considerable time 4 
waiting to get enough drafted men to fill up the regiment. 
They made four drafts while there, and got about forty 
men. They would draft about double the amount of men 
that was needed each time. 

When they came to be examined all that were farmers 
and had money would pay a certain amount and get clear 
from going to war. Finally after a while they got their 
men, and all who were poor and had no money to pay got 
a chance to go. 

Then we took the cars to Cincinnati, and from here to 
Louisville, Kentucky. Here they made a Christmas din¬ 
ner for us. We thought it was going to be turkey, such 
as we have when they give Christmas dinners, but instead 
it was rye bread and potatoes, with skins on, and coffee. 
This was the Christmas dinner for the soldiers. 

Now we take a car for Nashville, and went by Fort 
Donnellson, where Grant had captured 3,000 Rebels. The 
first thing that attracted me to Grant was his answer to 
the commander, who was arguing to have some conditions 
of surrender. Grant said if they don’t make an uncon¬ 
ditional surrender I will move on all your works at day¬ 
light. It is needless to say that he surrendered right off. 

The next day we put up at the Solly Croffee House. This 
was a very large hotel, built for a pleasure house. We 
put up in the basement of it, and used the rear part for our 
knapsacks and bedding, and the front part as a closet. 
Then they took box cars and put us on straw. We then 
rode 200 miles through the roughest country I ever saw, 

64 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


and we were expecting Rebels to throw something on the 
track all the way, but we finally got through in safety to 
Chattanooga. 

The squad I belonged to was assigned to the building 
of a fort. Here we worked for a long time, and lived on 
quarter rations. I remember one time I was detailed to 
go on picket duty. I got an order from the captain to go 
to the baker’s and get some bread. I had to march out 
with the squad two miles and a half. 

I was put on the third relief, which gave me six hours. 
Then I went back again to Chattanooga, and called on the 
baker, showed him the order for the bread. He said there 
had been one order there before from that captain, and 
he wouldn’t let me have the bread, after I had waded 
through the mud for about two and a half miles. 

Then I got mad. I said, if you could sell bread at six 
cents and a half to officers you could sell it to the men in¬ 
stead of their having to pay tewnty-five cents a loaf, and 
to trade off their clothes to pay it with. 

There were a few came down with a great lot of clothes. 
He gave the officers a certain amount if they would issue 
them to the soldiers. So every week we were issued to 
draw clothes if we wanted them. The boys would draw 
an overcoat, worth perhaps about $8, and trade it off for 
bread for whatever they could get for it, and I told him 
that was just the way the officers always tried to skin us 
on everything. 

So I went back to the command empty handed, and stood 
my turn as picket. While we were there the boys run 
across a poor old cow that could scarcely stand alone. 
They cut her throat and ate some of her meat. I told them 

65 




EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


they would be more hungry than before, for the old cow 
had starved to death herself. We had an alarm. A sen¬ 
tinel had fired a shot, thinking it was a Eebel, but it turned 
out to be only a critter out grazing. 

I met a young man that had got shot through the hand. 
He wouldn’t go to the hospital with it; so he and I tented 
together, and he kept house for me and I called him my 
wife. The officers had some apples shipped down to 
them, and they commenced to decay. So they fetched 
them out to the camp and threw them all around. The 
boys made a great scramble for them. I scrambled with 
the rest and was knocked over several times and couldn’t 
get one, but my man wife got four or five. 

We were short of wood at Chattanooga, and had to take 
three or four cars and go to Tunnel Hill, about eighteen 
miles. We would cut small trees and take them to the cars 
and load them. We would pile the wood on as full as the 
stakes would hold. Going through Tunnel Hill they would 
come near catching on to the stones as they went along. 
We were on top of the load, and if we caught the stone 
we were liable to a great smash-up. 

When we arrived at Chattanooga the way they divided 
the wood was to throw it off the cars, and each soldier 
would grab as much as he could carry, and my man-wife 
would get fully his share. I would have to dress his hand 
every third day. We were together about a month, and I 
think he was the best company I ever had. 

I was appointed officer over the guards. In this capa¬ 
city I acted a long while. We went on picket duty again. 
I had charge of the picket. When it came time for one 
fellow to go on duty he couldn’t be found high or low. So 

66 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


I had to take one of the extra soldiers to take his place. 
Before the next relief went on my missing man had been 
found rolled up in a blanket under the tent. So I made 
him stand his full time, which was four hours. 

He got a bounty of $1,500 to go down South to sol¬ 
dier, and he made up his mind that he would not soldier 
at all, and he began to act it out. 

I got a furlough for a day to go up on Lookout Moun¬ 
tain. The road was winding around the mountain, and 
within about 500 feet of the top was a fine spring, which 
was flowing out from under a rock. 

When I got to the top of the mountain it was a flat sur¬ 
face, about half a mile square. Our folks had built a hos¬ 
pital up there. The river runs right down against the 
mountain, and then turns an easterly course around the 
foot of the mountain. 

The mountain where it faces the river is 500 feet. To 
look straight down the trees below look like small bushes 
and the large steamers on the river look like little toy 
boats, and men would look to be about six inches high. 

On top of this mountain it was solid rock. Yet, strange 
to say, it was filled with small sea shells. On the east 
side of the mountain there was a steep slope, and our sol¬ 
diers had to pull themselves up by little bushes that they 
could get a hold of while the Rebels fired over their heads. 
WTien they got to the top of the mountain there was some 
great fighting done, but they soon gave way and left the 
mountain. 

From the top of the mountain you could see seven dif¬ 
ferent States. About midway down there was a cave. 
One of its mouths is in Tennessee and the other is down 
in Alabama. 


67 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 

On this mountain there were several rocks twenty-feet 
high. They were opposite to each other, and formed a 
highway. In the time of the war we heard a good deal 
about fighting a battle above the clouds, and it was fought 
on this mountain. 

At night I went down the mountain well paid for my 
day’s work. I never expected to go up there again. So 
I took a good observation of things. Now we received 
orders to march over the Mission Ridge to take charge 
of a block-house. When we got there the commander 
was gone, and we didn’t know whether it was the one we 
were assigned to or not; so I told the boys they might lay 
down. So we broke ranks and they lay down. 

About midnight the officer came. We found out that 
we had to march five miles farther. I ordered the com¬ 
mand on to the railroad. My Illinois man whom I had 
on picket once swore he wouldn’t go a step. I told the 
boys to fix bayonets and fetch him on to the railroad. This 
they declined to do. I suppose they were afraid he would 
shoot them. When they wouldn’t go I went. He fired 
off his rifle at me, but he didn’t hit me. Then I prodded 
him about three times, and it fetched him on the track 
pretty quick. I took his rifle away from him and made a 
prisoner of him. 

He went the five miles, saying he would shoot me the 
first time he got a loaded rifle, but the boys told him he 
had better be careful how he said it. When we got to the 
block-house we divided the squad, and part of us went on 
and part stayed there. 

I took command of it. Our duty was to guard the rail¬ 
road. Two of us had to walk on the track to the next 
block-house and back again. This was a dangerous work, 


68 





EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


for we were liable to get shot any moment by the Rebels. 

I would let some of them scout around to see if there 
were any Rebels about. I went once myself with a party. 
We saw wild turkeys’ tracks in the road, and I took the 
men and went down in the swamp a ways, but couldn’t see 
any of them. So we turned back. 

My two men had left their post and gone to a Rebel 
barn. They had left their guns up against a fence and 
went up into the hay loft to hunt for eggs. I took posses¬ 
sion of their guns, and when they came down I took them 
prisoners. There was one I called Shorty. He opened 
his bosom and, shoot me, but don’t take me a prisoner. So 
I gave him his gun again. 

We once went to Chickamauga Mill, and on the way we 
came to where the two roads meet, and here we didn’t 
know which one to take. We saw a hotel on the hill just 
above. We went and inquired, and before we got up to 
the hotel a Rebel run out with his rifle half loaded, shoving 
down the bullet. 

Four of my men run back down the hill again, and I 
run up the hill just as fast as I could, and Shorty stayed 
right by me. We inquired the way to Chickamauga mills, 
and went on. 

Now I gave my four men a good lecture. I asked them 
if they thought a Rebel could shoot them as well as when 
they were facing them as they could when they had their 
backs to them, for if there had been a half dozen Rebels 
or more they would have shot them deliberately. 

When we got to the mill we all filled our sacks full of 
meal; then we returned to Chickamauga. The rest of 
our company that were left behind had captured a lot of 
prisoners, and among them were some that had guarded 
the prison at Jackson, and they knew me, 

69 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


They wanted to know if I ever was in Jackson. I told 
them I gnessed I was, and I’ll never forget that month. 
They said there never was such a racket in Jackson as 
there was the morning I escaped from prison, and that 
they had shot the fellow that was on guard at the door. 

The idea of a man getting out of prison where there 
were sixteen men lying on the floor, and not one of them 
being wakened out of their sleep, and to saw off an iron bar 
and bend it over, which would require six men to have 
bent it, but I bent it alone just as easy as a tarred rope. 
Their dogs scoured the country everywhere, but couldn’t 
find any trace of me. This was the Rebels ’ opinion of my 
escaping out of Jackson. Among the prisoners were two 
squirrel-hunters that first arrested me. 

I then went to visit a camp of refugee women. There 
were only two men among them, and they were two min¬ 
isters. There were 500 or more women. We issued sol¬ 
dier rations to them. They were the most forlorn looking 
set I ever saw. They were camped in a piece of woods, 
and had scarcely any rags to cover themselves with. 

The boys in talking of the Rebels, one of the officers said 
that Jeff Davis was a smarter man than Abraham Lin¬ 
coln ever dared be. I told him if I had a Rebel to shoot or 
him I thought I would shoot him first. I told him to go 
over in the Rebel lines and die in the last ditch, for, said 
I, if ever your friends need you, they need you now, and 
he reduced me to the ranks for saying that. 

From Chattanooga we went to Knoxville, which was 
about 100 miles. We stayed there a few days, and then 
returned to Chattanooga. On the way to Chattanooga I 
saw the sharpest piece of stealing I ever saw done. 

There were five barrels of flour, which belonged to a set- 
70 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


tier. I saw one barrel go up to a car window, and that 
was the last I saw of it. The train didn’t stop over five 
minutes, and as soon as he missed the flour he detailed 
a guard and searched the train, and if there had been even 
a splinter of a speck of flour to have been found our com¬ 
mander and officer would have had to pay for it, which 
would have cost them $125. 

That was the smartest piece of stealing on record, but 
after we got to Chattanooga I had some cakes that were 
made out of the flour, but all the hand I had in it was to see 
the barrel of flour go up to the car window. 

We have returned to Chattanooga and gone North to the 
Tennessee river. The cars were loaded inside and out. 
I got as near to the centre of the car as I could. Some of 
the boys that were down near the edge of the car were 
shaken off and killed. 

Coal was so scarce that they would have to run down 
grade as fast as they could in order to get speed enough 
to send them up the next grade. We had to continue this 
until we reached the Tennessee River. Then we disem¬ 
barked ten steamboat loads of us and went down the river, 
thence up the Ohio River to Louisville. There they heard 
that Sherman’s bummers were coming, and they sent a 
guard down to prevent our landing. 

The boys pelted them with lumps of coal and they all 
got mad and presented their rifles to fire, but if they had 
ever fired there would have been lots of bloodshed. Our 
party detailed a guard, and wouldn’t let us go near the 
rail of the boat for fear they would jump off and desert. 

We went by a good many of the boys ’ homes. They had 
been to war about three years, and when they saw old 
home they felt like getting there; so they would jump in 
the river and the guards would fire at them, but never 

71 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


would hit any of them. It was a terrible sight to see the 
effort they made in swimming to get away. 

As we went along the towns in Indiana they would all 
gather along the banks to see the ten boat loads of soldiers 
go along. The boys would write some pretty hard things 
on paper and tie it to a lump of coal. Then they would 
throw it to the girls on the banks of the river, and when 
they read them I knew by the expression of their faces they 
were words that weren’t very nice. 

We stopped at Cincinnati, and put one old bachelor off 
the boat to the hospital. He lived just four days. After¬ 
wards two of our captains got a furlough for two hours to 
go on shore. 

While they were gone they went into a milliner’s shop 
and captured two or three bonnets and two wax dolls. 
They got full of whiskey and paraded up and down 
the boats with the bonnets on their heads and the doll 
babies in their arms, and made a ridiculous sight of them¬ 
selves. 

Then we went on from Cincinnati to "Wheeling, West 
Virginia. There we disembarked and went in box cars 
lined outside with sheet iron to keep the Rebels from shoot¬ 
ing us. 

It was a frosty morning. We went there, and they 
gave us a few bundles of straw to lay on. The tender 
was on top of the boiler of the engine, so as to keep it on 
the track as we were going down the Allegheny Moun¬ 
tains. 

When we got down the mountain we came to the Poto¬ 
mac River, and run down along the side of it about 100 
feet above the level of it, and I expected every minute we 
would go down into the river. When we got to Harper’s 
Ferry we disembarked, and they carried us over on a fer- 

72 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


ry-boat. Here they put us into the cars that had seats, 
and we left the old box cars behind, and went on to Wash¬ 
ington, D. C., in comfort. 

We stayed at Washington about a week, and did guard 
duty. Then we got orders to go across the chain bridge 
into Virginia. We marched about eight miles until we 
came to Alexandria. Here is where Colonel Elsworth 
was shot. 

We saw a number of ships with four decks. We em¬ 
barked on these ships. I took the upper deck. I pre¬ 
sume you all know what for. We sailed along by Wash¬ 
ington’s residence. 

Everything went on nicely that night. The next fore¬ 
noon we saw a school of porpoises rolling along in the 
water. I said look out for a storm, as I had always 
noticed those kind of fish play before a storm was com¬ 
ing. We went by Hamilton Roads, and were saluted by 
a fort there. 

That night we began to catch it, as the storm was com¬ 
ing on heavy as we were nearing Cape Hatteras. For 
three days and three nights the storm was terrific, and 
we were out in midocean. The captain couldn’t see to 
get his bearings, but the third day the sun came out, so he 
could get them. We had ropes to hang over the boat, and 
when we would see a breaker coming we would catch our 
ropes and hang on to them, so as not to be washed over¬ 
board as several other boys were. 

After the captain got his bearings he turned the boat 
part way around, and sailed towards North Carolina. 
These were the most dreadful days I ever put in on the 
sea. Half the time our topmast was in the swells of the 
sea, and there were no eating or drinking for those three 
days. 


73 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


When they opened the hatchways no hog pen ever smelt 
worse. Then they had two or three days’ work cleaning 
np the vessel. We passed one or two men-o’-war. They 
hailed ns and wanted to know of the captain what we were 
loaded with, and he told them he was loaded with males 
and soldiers. It made the soldiers mad because the cap¬ 
tain used the name mule ahead of the soldier. 

We sailed along by a good many wrecks of blockade- 
runners, which showed our gunboats had been very effec¬ 
tive. At last we reached the mouth of the river that runs 
down from Wilmington. Here we disembarked, and took 
smaller vessels and went up to Wilmington. There we 
disembarked and went into camp. 

We stayed here four days. Our guns were a fearful 
looking sight after the salty bath they had while on the 
ocean. It took four or five days to get them cleaned up in 
a presentable shape. We were then drawn up on dress 
parade for the officers’ review. Then we were issued 
five days’ rations. 

We had 400 bounty jumpers from New York. They 
said, we have money and won’t eat your hard tack. So 
they left it lying on the ground. The other boys gathered 
up as much of it as they could carry with their own. 

We took up our long march through the land of pitch 
pine and peanuts. Every now and then the boys would 
throw off their coats and the negroes would gather them 
up and take them away. 

North Carolina is one of the hardest places to march 
in I ever saw. It was sandy soil, and every step you took 
it gave way under foot. We came to one old farmer who 
had 500 bushels of peanuts buried. 

When we broke ranks we would form a line right along 
74 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


and take onr ramrods and stick in the ground, and when 
we found soft ground we would dig for treasure. In this 
way we captured the old fanner’s peanuts. The old fel¬ 
low grunted terrible about it, but we carried off every one 
of them. 

When we got orders to halt the boys began to look for 
rails, and maybe they would get orders to march three or 
four miles farther on, and they would carry the rails on 
their backs to have them for cooking their rations with. 

Those who gathered up the extra hard tacks sold them 
back to the fellows for $1 apiece, as they could not find a 
place to buy other food, as they supposed they could. 

I was on picket duty one night, and one of these fellows 
offered me $500 to let him through the lines. I told him 
he would have to see some of the Rebels before he got 
home, and if he attempted to go through the lines I would 
shoot him. 

The next we had an engagement with Rebels several 
were killed and a number wounded. We had some of the 
enemy’s cavalry on our flanks, picking us off every day. 
So we had to march in fighting order all the way. 

We came to a Rebel fort. So we deployed out and went 
through the woods. The bullets went whistling by our 
ears every second. We were running up towards the fort 
with our knapsacks on; my suspender buttons both gave 
way; so I had to stop and repair up. 

When I caught up to the command again they had cap¬ 
tured the fort and a lot of prisoners besides; also the Rebel 
mail, and divided it among the soldiers. We found one 
letter that was written to a mother from a boy who was 
in the Rebel Army at Richmond. 

He said, I will soon be home, mother. All the swell- 
heads are leaving Richmond. Jeff Davis went to-day. 

75 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


Grant’s army is in sight of Richmond. The boys all had 
a good cheer over that. One boy was loading his gun to 
go on picket duty. It was a sixteen-shooter. 

While he was shoving the bullets down the Rebel that 
was looking on said he was shoving down a big bellyfull. 
Yes, said he, when he gets his bellyfull he is good for six¬ 
teen Rebels. 

They marched us until they marched every ounce of 
strength I had. It was raining, and I hadn’t strength 
enough to cook my mess. I just couldn’t do anything but 
lay down. 

When three brigade bands struck up and played ‘ ‘ Hail, 
Columbia,” it just strengthened me so much that I got up 
and got my supper. One night we heard cannonading oft 
on our right. We were ordered to fall in on light march¬ 
ing order. We had a lot of Indiana farmers, and when 
they found that they had to go into battle they were a sick 
set. So we left them to fetch on the baggage, and we went 
on double quick, but when we got there it was only John¬ 
son blowing up his armament. 

The next day we got news that Abraham Lincoln was 
assassinated. If one of my nearest friends had been dead 
I wouldn’t have felt as bad. The Rebels came crawling 
in on their bellies, expecting that we were going to kill 
every one of them. We told them we had no idea of kill¬ 
ing them, and that we knew they were not to blame for 
the deed. 

The next day we marched to Sherman’s headquarters. 
Now we all marched in battle array on four different 
roads. Every once in a while we would be fired on by a 
lot of Rebels. One night I was out on picket and took a 
Rebel prisoner. When we got to the light where I could 
see he said, I was too old a man to come down and fight 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR . 


we’ons. I told him if we’ons wouldn’t live under the flag 
I would come down if I was a hundred years old and whip 
them until they would live under the flag. He said he was 
always wiling to live under it. I said some of you weren’t 
willing to live under it, for you had a rattlesnake for your 
ensign. 

While marching I came across a fellow with a chicken’s 
leg in his hand, and the woman had it by the head. She 
said she just paid $2 for the chicken and wanted to cook 
it, but the fellow said he must have it and jerked it away 
from her and went on. 

The next we came to was Raleigh, in North Carolina. 
The capital building had the Rebel flag floating from the 
top. The boys went up to take down the flag, and the 
Rebels shot at them. There were two Rebels up there, 
and they shot them very quick. 

We were assigned to guard the asylum. It was up on 
a high hill. The rest of the town lay below it. Sher¬ 
man’s army numbered about 110,000. They messed two 
together, which made about 50,000 fires. 

There was a crazy man at asylum. He kept walking 
up and down the veranda, saying, I never expect to see 
such a sight again until the day of judgment. 

Here Grant showed himself to be noble. The Rebels 
wanted a condition for surrender, and General Sherman 
was about to give them some condtions of surrender when 
Grant heard of it. He came down and told General Sher¬ 
man that he must have an unconditional surrender and 
trust to our mercy. 

Grant might have taken the surrender himself, and if he 
had it would have killed General Sherman in the minds 
of the American people, but he left it to Sherman to take 
the surrender, only it must be unconditional. 

L. of C. 77 



EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


Sherman’s army was divided into four corps, and 
marched on four different roads to Richmond. We were 
just a hundred miles from Richmond, and we marched it in 
five days. The four commanders made a bargain with 
each other that the commander of the corps that reached 
Richmond first would have $150. They marched them on 
a run, and then told us they were marching only ten miles 
a day. That march cost thirty men’s lives. 

After the war was all over, just to accommodate some 
of the officers’ pride, and to see who could get their corps 
to Richmond first, we had to wait a half day to have some 
pontoon bridges put down. These pontoon bridges are 
made of duck, and set bow upstream and fasten by a cable. 
Then they have stringers from one boat to another and 
lay a plank on them. We marched a mile on that, every 
step we took it swayed, and it seemed as if we would go 
out from under us; but we got over all safe. They had to 
pontoon four or five rivers before we got to Richmand. 

The negroes lined the road on each side. We came to a 
plantation where they hadn’t seen any army or any whites 
—they thought we were going to kill them, and to see 500 
or 600 running away from us as fast as they could run— 
men, women and children. The boys yelled at them to see 
if they could make them run faster. It was quite a novel 
sight to see them run. 

We arrived at Richmond and found two corps there 
ahead of us. Here we stayed in camp for four days. The 
first night I slept there. In the morning when I got up and 
took my blanket up off the ground there were four little 
copper-headed snakes. If they had stung me it would 
have been all day with me, but it was cold. So I don’t 
suppose they were lively enough to sting me. I soon fixed 
them so they wouldn’t sting anybody. 

78 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 


Sherman’s army took delight in blackguarding the Po¬ 
tomac army. The Potomac army had white collars on, 
and Sherman’s bummers would hello, there goes a fellow 
with my pay roll around his neck. That is the reason 
we haven’t got our pay. They cleaned out one Potomac 
settler. 

I got a furlough and crossed Belle River, and went into 
Richmond. I saw Libbey Prison and the trench where 
Colonel Strait had dug to get out of prison. I spent the 
day in sightseeing around Richmond. I thought it was 
rather a pretty place. They had a large park there, and 
I sat there part of the day viewing things around me. 

I went back to camp again. The next morning we start¬ 
ed for Washington. The Potomac army was drawn up in 
line on both sides of the road for a mile or more. We 
marched on through Richmond out to the Seven Pines, 
where McClellan’s army had been for two years before, 
and they could have taken Richmond just as well as not. 

There was only a little force guard there then to guard 
the city. I expect that McClellan dare not risk a battle for 
fear he might lose it. Then he knew he would lose the 
Presidency. 

You could see the spires of Richmond from the Seven 
Pines. We marched on towards Washington, over the 
grounds where the Potomac army had fought. There was 
not a rail left as far as you could see, or scarcely a house. 
We crossed a stream where we had to take off our clothes 
and put them on our heads and wade through. We went 
until we came to Bull Run. Here we had another stream 
to wade through. We saw one hundred and fifty men 
from Andersonville. They had been in prison there, and 
they were just skin and bones. You would scarcely know 
they were men. They were so emaciated they were litr- 


OCT 5 1903 


EXPERIENCES IN THE CIVIL WAR. 

ally starved to death. We camped near Arlington 
Heights, and stayed there one day and night while they 
prepared for a grand review. 

The next day we marched into Washington. It took ns 
three hours and a half to pass a given point. The streets 
were wide in Washington, so we could march a company 
in one platoon.. Pennsylvania Avenue is one mile long 
from the Capitol Building to the WTiite House. 

The streets were filled from curb to curb with soldiers. 
They had the grand stand opposite the White House. 
Many of the regiments had their flags torn, so that you 
could scarcely tell they had ever been a flag. 

We went into camp about one mile outside of Washing¬ 
ton. We used to go down to Washington every day to see 
the sights. I have seen the parks full of Sherman soldiers 
lying sound asleep in the middle of the day. I thought 
they were taking their rest, and was glad to see them. 
There were signs up all over to keep off the grass, for 
Sherman’s army had the freedom of the city. They mus¬ 
tered them out as fast "" ould and paid them. 

I got transportadc is to go to my regiment. 

They thought it would ue nm .red out in Chicago, where 
it was mustered in. When l got there I couldn’t find the 
regiment or the mustering out officer; so I had to get 
transportation again to go back. 

Then they gave me sufficient authority to be mustered 
out if I could only find my regiment. This time I went 
to Memphis, Tennessee. There I found my regiment had 
done duty there, and had been mustered out. I then re¬ 
turned to Chicago again and was mustered out, and paid 
$560 June 20, 1865. This ended my war career. 

MB 2.4. 3he end. 


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